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COPYRIGHT DEPOSnV 



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TOO MANY. WOMEN 


TOO MANY 

WOMEN 


A BACHELOR’S 
STORY 

--if 

u ' 



NEW YORK 

FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS 



Copyright, 1910, by 
FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 



©CI,A265751 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 


JANUARY 

The Complete Bachelors ....... >, i 

An Unconventional Friendship . . „ .. 8 

The House Party at the Bellews* . ... 15 

Clive Massey, Englishman 25 

FEBRUARY 

A Citizen of Bohemia 33 

Lady Fullard plays the Part of Candid Friend . . 39 

Dulcie and Mrs. Mallow hold their Own .... 45 

A Theatrical Ball 50 

MARCH 

The Offices of the “Evening Star** 61 

Mr. and Mrs. Ponting-M allow at Home 66 

Massey excites Suspicion — and justifies it ... . 70 

The Correspondence of a Comedy Queen .... 78 

Steward Dines Out ..... .. ., . . ., .t ., 85 

APRIL 

Mrs. Mallow checkmates . .. 93 

Cynthia Cochrane makes another Conquest . ., .. ... 102 

A Young Man*s Fancy** w i.i >, .1 ,.i 113 

MAY 

The Philosopher in Hyde Park . . r.. ., . .: . . 125 

East of the Sun, West of the Moon” ...... 133 

Massey champions the Stage ,.1 .1 .1 ..i .. . . 143 

A Dialogue at a Dance . . .1 i.. .1 .1 . .. . I 49 

JUNE 

The Capture of Major Griffiths iS 5 

An Actress Interviewed 161 

Family Cares 169 

Miss Audrey Maitland goes to Royal Ascot and returns 176 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 


JULY 

A Festival in Bohemia ..... .1 .• . . 189 

Lords and Ladies ....... ...... 197 

The Major Married . . . ., .1 . . 201 

A Scene behind the Scenes ., 207 

AUGUST 

Mrs. Mallow is found out . . » . >; :.i ,.i . . 221 

The Parable of the Man who did . . . ., . 229 

Romance and a Cricket Week . . . i. ., . 235 


SEPTEMBER 

Steward makes a Confession of Faith ....... 247 


Ben Machree Lodge, Rosshire, N. B . . 256 

George Burn*s Escapade at Dieppe . > .. . 269 


OCTOBER 

The Progress of Mrs. Mallow 

The Return of Major Griffiths , 

The Green-eyed Monster in Jermyn Street . 

A Crash in the Grecian Restaurant . „ 

NOVEMBER 

Steward tells an Old Tale . ., . 

Cynthia Cochrane says Good-by .. .. ., „ 

Back to Fleet Street . „ i., ci -i 

Two in a Fog .. . r.. 


. 281 
,. 286 
. 294 
. 300 


>. 313 
» 324 
331 

i.i 336 


DECEMBER 

H anbury v. H anbury, Rev. Sturgis Intervening ., r.i 347 
The Plight of a Fiance . ... 354 

A Bachelor Deceased .i ;•] m m m ;«i [.i [.j ;,| ,.j 3^0 


JANUARY 


" Why do I keep single? Perhaps T love too many women too 
well, — or, possibly, too many too little! — John Oliver 
Hobbes, “The Ambassador,” Act I. 



TOO MANY WOMEN 



Too Many Women 


JANUARY 

The Complete Bachelors — 'An Unconventional Friend- 
ship — The House Party at the Bellews' — Clive 
Massey, Englishman 

M arriage is a mug’s game.” 

George Burn screwed his eyeglass in with a 
grimace, and crossed his feet on the mantelpiece, as 
though he had said something clever. Archie Haines 
and myself exclaimed ‘‘Hear, hear!” We are both 
in the thirties, so we ought to have known better. At 
that moment the maid entered with a letter. 

“ Another check from one of your Fleet Street pals, 
Hanbury?” asked Haines idly. I double the roles 
of barrister and “ free lance ” indifferently, yet Haines 
always talks as though I had found a gold mine. 

“ No such luck,” I replied, scrutinizing the envelope. 
“ It’s from my fond parent. Excuse me ! ” and draw- 
ing out the contents I read the following: 

“ My dear Gerald : 

“ We were glad to have news of you and your do- 
ings the other day, and to hear that you are making 
progress in that combination of law and literature 
which you call ‘your profession.’ But your mother 
and I are getting a little anxious about your future. 
You show no signs of settling down, although you are 
now at an age when most young men have undertaken 


2 


TOO ]\IANY WOiMEX 


the responsibilities of marriage, and all that marriage 
means. Nothing would give us greater pleasure than 
to hear you had concentrated your wandering affec- 
tions upon a particular object. I don’t mean that you 
ought to propose to the first girl you meet, but I do 
think you should seriously contemplate matrimony. 
I offer you this intimate advice in your own interest. 
The middle-aged bachelor is a constant source of 
anxiety to himself and his friends, and I should be 
sorry to see you playing that unsatisfactory role. 
Moreover, the wider interests of life are not entered 
upon until one is married. 

“ Your mother is the more concerned about you, as 
she thinks she notices a growing inclination on your 
part to frivolous self-indulgence. Let me say that I 
don’t quite share her view, which is colored by her 
maternal anxiety, but I do think you want a little 
more ballast if your career is to be the successful one 
we have every reason to anticipate it will be. There 
is no better ballast than a wife. 

“ Your affectionate Father.’’^ 

‘'George! Archie,” I said, as I finished my private 
perusal of the document, “ what do you think of this ? ” 
And Lproc!*eded to repeat the contents aloud for my 
companions’ benefit. George’s only comment on my 
father’s effusion was to whistle through his teeth, an 
objectionable habit which does not endear him to his 
friends. 

“A very proper letter,” remarked Haines. He is 
a stockbroker and enjoys his little joke. “It’s a 
scandal, Hanbury, that you haven’t long since recog- 
nized your responsibilities in the matter. You’ll be 
getting gray-haired before you’ve found a wife,” 


JANUARY 


‘‘I shall be gray-haired precious soon after IVe 
found one,” I retorted. What about George, 
though ? Isn’t he to be included in your indictment ? ” 
Oh, George ! ” And Haines shrugged his 
shoulders. “ George’s heart is licensed to carry twelve 
inside. If Lady Lucy and the rest of them like to 
strap hang in his affections, it’s no concern of ours. 
You’re a respectable and responsible member of So- 
ciety. George isn’t ! ” 

George smiled fatuously. He positively reveled in 
his infamy. But if once the conversation gets on 
to George Burn and his escapades, it has a knack 
of staying there. This time I was determined it 
shouldn’t. 

Seriously,” I said, ‘‘ must I give up all this ? ” — 
and I waved my arm round the comfortable Jermyn 
Street room in which we sat, littered with the trophies 
of the bachelor from gun cases to pipe cleaners, — 
‘‘because my father thinks I want more ballast? — 
Ballast!” 

“You needn’t swear, Hanbury!” interrupted 
Haines. “ Think what you get in return 1 ” 

“ Five foot four of chiffon and lace, and a yard of 
milliner’s bills every quarter,” put in George, roused 
by the controversy from his reverie. “ The fault I 
find with the whole system,” he went on, “ is that one 
never knows what one’s getting. Put a wedding ring 
on a woman’s finger, and you change her whole nature. 
The simple little girl from the vicarage, who ought 
to be a model of domesticity, makes a bee line for the 
Smart Set, while the fashionable young woman, who 
is to found a salon, and win her husband a place in 
the Cabinet, throws her curling tongs into the area, 
and becomes a District Visitor. Look at Basil ! ” 


4 TOO MANY WOMEN 

“ Poor old Basil ! ” Haines’ voice had a reflective 
note of melancholy. “ But then, what could you ex- 
pect from a fellow who thought all beautiful women 
were good, and whose idea of marriage was holding 
his wife’s hand in the spare time he wasn’t showing 
her off to an admiring world at the Carlton? Be- 
sides, Basil found his taste at twenty-eight wasn’t 
quite the same as it had been three years earlier, and 
that he had nothing in common with his wife save 
selfishness and ignorance of life. He wanted to dine 
at home sometimes, but she didn’t. He wanted to ask 
his own friends to shoot, but she had always filled the 
house with hers. Her notion of economy was to cut 
short her husband’s cigars, and dock his wine bill. 
He thought he could retrench on his wife’s dress al- 
lowance. As a consequence Basil lives at his club, 
and Mrs. B in her electric brougham.” 

And the best place for them,” I said, as I got up 
from my chair by the fire, and crossing over to the 
American roll-top desk with its tangle of proofsheets 
and manuscripts, that are the heritage of the literary 
man, proceeded to seat myself in front of the neces- 
sary writing materials. 

‘‘ What shall I reply to my father ? ” 

George squirted some soda water into a glass. 
‘‘ Say his idea is all rot, and that you aren’t ' taking 
any.’ ” 

“ Do put your suggestions in English, and not 
dialect ! ” 

George made a fresh start. ‘‘ My dear Dad,” he 
.dictated. 

I laid my pen down. “ If you can’t do better than 
that, you must leave it to Archie. Archie? ” And I 
turned to where Haines lay stretched at ease. 


JANUARY 


5 


“What line do you want me to take?” that in- 
dividual asked. “Tentative or abrupt, a gentle toy- 
ing with the proposal, or a stern rejection? ” 

“ Please yourself,” I said. “ Only don’t be too 
dramatic ! ” 

Haines cleared his throat and began: 

“Your letter has come as a great surprise to me, 
but a wholesome one. I realize how little I have done 
to deserve your affection, and how ill I have requited 
it by my indolence and selfishness. I see things in 
their true light at last, and am prepared to meet your 
wishes in every way. Please put up my banns as soon 
as possible with any lady you like, and your choice 
in the matter shall be that of your repentant son, 
Gerald.” 

“ There’s a model of filial obedience for you,” and 
Haines looked at me for approval. “ Why, you 
haven’t taken a word of it down, Hanbury ! ” 

“ I could have done better for you than that,” ex- 
claimed George. 

“ My dear Archie,” I said, “ if you knew my 
father’s taste in the fair sex you wouldn’t leave the 
choice to him. Also you magnify my sense of duty. 
I may be thoughtless, but Pm not qualifying for an 
asylum just yet. Try again on the other tack.” 

Haines assumed an expression of pained solicitude, 
but he obeyed. 

“Nothing could give me greater pleasure than to 
fall in with your and mother’s idea. I know I have 
been an unsatisfactory son to you both ” 

“ Haines ! ” I spoke sharply. “ Not so much 
stress on the ‘unsatisfactory,’ if you please! I don’t 
want lessons from you in how to behave to my peo- 
ple.” 


6 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Haines, however, was wound up, and my admoni- 
tion passed unheeded. 

“—and that I have caused you much anxiety in the 
past. For the future, it shall be my task to do all I 
can for you, to live within my allowance, to consort 
only with good companions, and generally to live a 
blameless life. But I regret I cannot obey you where 
marriage is concerned. I was born a bachelor 

“ Who ever heard of any one being born anything 
else? ’’ interrupted George, with an emphasis of scorn. 

“ — and a bachelor I shall remain, holding that with 
Woman * distance lends enchantment to the view.’ 
Your devoted son, Gerald.” 

I rose and held out my hand to Haines. “ Archie, 
there’s a fortune awaiting you in the East as a pro- 
fessional letter writer, but you’re of no use to me. I’ll 
do the job for myself when you and George have 
gone.” 

“ Answer the confounded thing in any way you like, 
Hanbury,” growled Haines, as the pair made a con- 
sorted raid on my whisky and cigarettes preparatory 
to departure. “ You might display a little gratitude, 
anyhow.” 

I held the door open. 

“ I’m full of gratitude to you for showing me how 
not to do it. If I sent your precious letter I should be 
either married to a female who would have no 
thoughts above following the beagles, or find myself 
cut off with a shilling as a hypocrite.” 

“ You know nothing about diplomacy,” retorted the 
retreating Haines. 

“ You know less about my father.” And the door 
closed on him. 

Then I sat down again and wrote this : 


JANUARY 


7 


Dear Father : 

“ It’s awfully good of you and mother to be so con- 
cerned about my prospects, professional and matri- 
monial. I’m not doing much in the way of bar work 
yet, as I don’t possess the influence or ability which 
make for success on the part of the briefless barrister. 
If I do happen to meet the daughter of a leading so- 
licitor at a dance or elsewhere she’s always so plain 
that I can’t persuade myself to advance my legal pros- 
pects at the expense of my reputation as a man of 
taste. 

‘‘As regards your advice that I should ‘seriously 
contemplate matrimony,’ I do contemplate it seriously, 
so seriously that I can’t undertake it for the present. 
I’ve not got the qualities to make a woman happy. 
I am too particular about my meals, and I should in- 
sist upon smoking in the drawing-room. I should 
hate to shatter any young girl’s ideals of my sex. If 
I married an unselfish woman. I’d make her miserable, 
if a selfish one, she’d make me miserable. Perhaps 
some day I may come across a good and beautiful girl 
who will look after me as a labor of love. I want 
too much supervision to marry any one who doesn’t 
fully realize the responsibilities she is undertaking. 

“You say I show no signs of settling down. I 
should be false to my ambitions and ideals if I under- 
went the process of settling down that most married 
men undergo, the settling down that one sees in a 
pudding, into a solid and indigestible mass. I don’t 
want my horizon limited by the four walls of a 
suburban villa. I am confident I can be successful on 
my own lines, but they are not the narrow gauge of 
married life. Of course, I am prepared to admit that 
my views may undergo a change. At present I am 


8 


TOO MANY WOMEN 

heart-whole, and likely to remain so. When I am 
mortally wounded in the duel of sex, my outcry will 
summon the only physician able to effect a cure, 
namely the rector of a fashionable church. 

“ Please impress upon mother that “what she thinks 
is self-indulgence is merely the necessary manifesta- 
tion of the artistic life. You might add that I am al- 
ways on the look-out for a cheaper cigar than a shill- 
ing Upman that is fit to smoke, but so far I haven t 
been able to find one. 

Your affectionate son, 

“ Gerald.^^ 

After all, there are some things a man does best 
for himself. Whatever Haines may be able to do in 
the way of ‘‘ bulling the market and ‘‘ selling a 
bear,” he can’t write letters. 

I am beginning to think that I haven’t handled my 
acquaintance with Cynthia Cochrane with quite the 
sure touch I am accustomed to show. This morning 
I got the following note from her, written with a 
spluttering nib in her dressing-room at the “ Alcazar ” 
Theater : 

Dear old Boy : 

I’m beginning to get a wee bit angry with you for 
not coming to look me up once last week. I don’t 
like being neglected by my friends, and especially such 
an old one as you are. Do be a pal, Gerald, and come 
and see me! I’ve had the ‘blues’ lately, and you’re 
the best person I know to chase them away. 

“ Yours with love (if you want it), 

“ Cynthia.” 


JANUARY 


9 


Cynthia was with a touring company at a Devon- 
shire seaside place when I first met her some nine 
years ago now. I was a member of what was, in 
Oxford language, called a reading party,” but which 
really proved an association of five undergraduates for 
golfing, fishing — anything, in fact, rather than for 
the acquisition of sufficient legal knowledge to pass 
the examiners in the Honor School of Law. It was 
a windy morning on the Esplanade, and Miss Coch- 
rane's hat blew off just as she came abreast of George 
Burn and myself, who were sitting on the sea wall 
discussing her points. The hat was in a particularly 
frisky mood, and it gamboled and skipped down the 
stone causeway as if it were in training for the sprint 
at the 'Varsity sports. George and I gave it twenty 
yards start, and then raced after it like two gray- 
hounds slipped for the Waterloo Cup. George pos- 
sessed a better turn of speed than I did, but just as 
he reached the quarry it gave a swerve, and I pounced 
on it with such vigor that my fist went through the 
straw crown. What with George's language and Miss 
Cochrane's laughter when I brought the wreckage 
back, I lost my head and asked her to come to tea 
with us as a sign that I had her forgiveness. With a 
friend she came, and conquered, and the reading 
party took five stalls for the remaining nights of the 
Golden Belle. 

The climax of our hospitality was reached by a 
supper-party after the last performance on the Satur- 
day, and for which the local cellars and provision 
merchants' were ransacked for appropriate delicacies. 
To the hosts, whose hearts glowed with a delightful 
sense of Bohemian abandon, the festivity was a 
triumph, unclouded by tlie landlady's hair-net falling 


10 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


into the soup tureen, or the hired waiter’s partiality 
for ‘‘bubbly water,” indulged in behind the screen. 
As for our guests, we thought them peerless, although 
one of the ladies was old enough to be our mother, 
another’s complexion ran into crimson streaks during 
the feast, and a third’s conversational resources were 
limited to an explanation why she ought to have been 
the leading lady, from which position apparently some 
“ envious cat ” had ousted her. I was finally aroused, 
by her eternal iteration of this fact, to the point of 
telling her that any one with half an eye could see 
why she wasn’t playing the “ lead.” Thereupon she 
relapsed into silence for the rest of the proceedings. 
We speeded the company away at midday on Sunday, 
and I was left with a signed photograph, and a scented 
lace handkerchief, to mark the episode. 

The mental stress of my “ Schools,” and the excite- 
ments of autumn sport, drove recollection of the affair 
from my thoughts. Following my golden rule, I 
made no attempt to correspond with Cynthia. I dis- 
courage casual correspondence between the sexes on 
the ground that the sentiments on the paper are never 
interpreted in the sense in which they were written. 
I don’t like a girl reading between the lines, and then 
getting annoyed because one’s actions don’t come up 
to her imaginary standard. If I have anything to tell 
a woman. I’ll unburden myself in speech. When I 
write, “ I’m so sorry I shan’t see you till Tuesday, as 
I am going out of town,” it means what it says, and 
not “ O my darling, how the hours will drag till I 
gaze into your eyes once more.” And yet nine 
women out of ten would put the second construction 
on the simple sentence if one had paid them any atten- 
tions. I repeat that I had forgotten about Cynthia 


JANUARY 


11 


till a postcard suddenly announced the end of the tour 
and Cynthia’s arrival in London. 

Since then my acquaintance has run the normal 
course of such friendships — a Covent Garden ball 
together, motor drives to the Metropole at Brighton, 
and the Star and Garter at Richmond, lunches at the 
Trocadero and Pagani’s, a never-to-be-forgotten din- 
ner at Kettner’s and suppers galore. Cynthia would be 
away for months at a time on a tour, undergoing the 
nerve-destroying experiences of Sunday train jour- 
neys from one end of England and Scotland to the 
other, of incessant shiftings of wardrobes and para- 
phernalia from theater to theater, of the discomforts 
of theatrical lodgings — ^but so soon as ever she came 
back I would always hear from her, and we picked up 
our friendship where it had dropped, the threads un- 
raveled by time. 

Cynthia’s touring days ended eighteen months ago 
with the securing of a pantomime engagement at the 
Paddington “ Grand,” where the sale of her picture 
postcards representing her as Little Boy Blue broke 
all records. Her performance in the character was so 
superior to the general standard of “ principal boys ” 
that Mason of the ‘‘ Alcazar ” secured- her on a three 
years’ contract, and immediately cast her for an impor- 
tant part in his ‘‘new and original musical play.” 
I expected that, with the rise in her fortunes and con- 
sequent demand for her company on the part of the 
numerous section of society which regards supper 
with stage favorites as a form of tonic, I should see 
less and less of Cynthia, but with a constancy that it 
is unusual to find across the footlights, she continued 
to accept my invitations, even at the expense of other 
folks’. The great bond between the actress and myself 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


12 

is that we take each other’s friendship as a matter of 
course, our intimacy needing none of those forced 
displays of affection to keep it going which so many 
theatrical acquaintanceships require. 

I have begun of late, however, to notice a subtle 
change in Cynthia’s outlook on the world. She is 
beginning to wonder whether the stage does not unfit 
its votaries for family life. Usually so independent, 
she now proclaims the fact that she is tired of wander- 
ing about on her own; ordinarily so ambitious, she 
hesitated for a long time before she decided to sign 
her contract with Mason, and gain the advertisement 
of the “Alcazar.” I don’t like those symptoms, nor 
the firm belief she professes in platonic friendship. 
Now, if I am certain of one thing it is that such a 
state of suspended animation in the affections is im- 
possible for men and women. There can be no stand- 
ing still in friendship between the sexes. Sooner or 
later one of the pair will cross the frontier dividing 
friendship from love. 

It was at the dinner at Kettner’s, served in one 
of the cabinets particuliers for which that famous 
Bohemian restaurant is justly renowned, where the 
soft-tinted hangings on the walls, the antique, gold- 
embossed furniture, and the general atmosphere of 
mellow peace and seclusion brooding over the old- 
world surroundings fill the guests with a sense of 
curious expectation, as though of some cherished 
secret of existence about to be revealed, — it was at 
Kettner’s that Cynthia caused me serious embarrass- 
ment by bursting into floods of tears and sobbing out 
how unhappy she was. I look upon the emotions of 
theatrical ladies as part of the business — so much stage 
thunder — but a man’s vanity is inclined to take the 


JANUARY 


IS 


individual feelings he arouses as unique and lasting. 
Were a woman to say that she liked me, I should 
believe she was my devoted admirer, but should 
another of my sex be the object of her avowal, I 
should unhesitatingly call him conceited, if he treated 
the matter as anything more than the lightest bad- 
inage. Therefore I took the display as a personal 
compliment, dropped the air of amused and tolerant 
cynicism I adopt, as a rule, for my own protection, 
and did my best to console Cynthia, my sympathy 
taking the extremely ineffective form of stroking her 
hand and telling her that the waiter must not see her 
with red eyes, that a becoming hat was not improved 
by being crushed against a dress coat, and that the 
darkest clouds have a silver lining — an irritating 
aphorism bearing, by the way, no relation to the facts 
of life. Amidst the storm of weeping, I gathered that 
nobody cared for her, that I was very unkind, and 
she wished we had never met. I pointed out that there 
was no logical connection between her premises and 
conclusion, also that it was absurd to say that nobody 
cared for her, because I did. I meant neither more 
nor less than that. I am quite fond of Cynthia — in 
a way; she is amusing and lively, with a point of 
view of her own, her life of independent exertion 
having given her a broader outlook than that pos- 
sessed by the insipid damsels of society, who relapse 
into silence as soon as they have exhausted the topics 
of the ballroom floor and the latest engagement. I 
am fond of Cynthia in a way, but not a marrying 
way, merely one of good fellowship. Woman-like, 
Cynthia read a good deal more into my sympathetic 
efforts, for she took an unfair advantage of me by 
turning up her face to be kissed. I believe I possess 


u 


TOO ]\IANY WOMEN 


self-control in no slight degree, but it doesn’t survive 
a test such as Cynthia submitted to it. I give a pair 
of blue eyes, a rosebud mouth and a dimpled chin any- 
thing they ask. I kissed Cynthia — and more than, 
once. After that it was no good protesting that I only 
took a fatherly interest in the welfare of a charming 
young actress, so I threw myself with zest into the 
role of an ardent lover, but it wasn’t till next morning, 
with a damp fog showing white against my window- 
panes, that I realized I had, perhaps, overacted the 
part. 

Since that night I have taken to seeing Cynthia not 
more than once a week, on the theory that absence 
does not make the heart grow fonder,” although in 
her case the system can’t be said to have yielded satis- 
factory results. I object to district messenger boys 
coming round before I am out of my bath with frantic 
notes ordering me to be at the Marble Arch in a 
“ taxi ” at three, third tree from the left.” I don’t 
like to be told to hurry up with the earrings you 
promised me, because Cissy is making all the girls 
green with jealousy over her pearl necklace.” 
What’s Hecuba to me, or I to Hecuba ? 

All the same I must settle up something, and 
quickly. The worst is that, while I can exercise com- 
mon sense over the affair here in my rooms, that 
quality is conspicuous by its absence when I meet the 
fair enemy face to face. Anyhow, in my sober mo- 
ments I agree with Steward, my old colleague on the 
Evening Star, who once said to me in a moment of 
confidence, Half the crimes and all the follies of the 
world are due to women. The chief advantage of 
Fleet Street is that they are there kept at arm’s length 
—-generally behind a typewriter. The only editor I 


JANUARY 


15 


knew who tolerated them compounded with his credi- 
tors for seven shillings and sixpence in the pound, 
but he was mentally bankrupt years before he filed his 
petition.” George Burn holds similar views, but more 
coarsely expressed: ‘‘Women are all right as orna- 
ments in a drawing-room, or for driving in a hansom 
with, but they are infernal nuisances as a perma- 
nency.” As George has three unmarried sisters I dis- 
count his opinion. 

The problem of my relations with Cynthia must 
wait. I can’t be bothered to do anything just yet 
until I’ve decided once and for all whether I shall 
change my tailor for the fellow in Seville Row whom 
Haines recommended. .My last tail coat was nothing 
less than an outrage. Still, I might as well run round 
this afternoon and take the little girl out for a drive 
to cheer her up. After the good times we’ve had to- 
gether, I mustn’t be too abrupt in my behavior to her. 
Besides, her eyes have just the shade of blue I can’t 
resist. 

What a pity it is that there aren’t more hostesses 
like Mrs. Bellew ! If there were, I should never suffer 
the agonies of doubt and hesitation that rack me when- 
ever I receive country-house invitations, doubts as to 
whether the discomfort of packing, traveling, and the 
cancelling of other engagements by excuses more or 
less ingenious will be compensated for by pleasures 
equal to those I am leaving behind in my flat, and the 
dwellings of hospitable cockneys. But about South- 
lands there can be no misgivings. From the tea at 
one’s bedside at 8 a. m. till the last “ nightcap ” be- 
fore turning in any time after midnight, everything 
is done that can make the bachelor rejoice. The 


16 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


valeting is perfection, the bath is laid on exactly right, 
the hot dishes and fresh toast at breakfast outlast the 
appetite of the most voracious, and the appearance of 
the most belated guest. There is none of the dra- 
gooning of visitors in the choice of the day’s pro- 
gramme, too often indulged in from a mistaken sense 
of hospitality, so one can shoot, fish, ride, play be- 
zique, or “ kiss-in-the-ring ” with equal freedom. Old 
Bellew doesn’t keep his best wine and cigars for the 
Lord-Lieutenant and the county bigwigs, but puts ’92 
Pommery, and Havanas of a crop which never knew 
the Yankee and his manures, before briefless barristers 
and newly gazetted subalterns. His wife exercises 
equal generosity and taste in the matter of the girls 
she has staying with her. When she marched into 
the Hunt ball the other night at the head of her forces, 
she was followed by the acknowledged belles of the 
evening. Dolly Thurston and Faith Bellew would 
hold their own in Belgrave Square, or at the Ritz. 
'Down in Loamshire they made all the other women 
look guys. 

But the favors I have received from Mrs. Bellew, 
and the favors I hope to receive, cannot blind me to 
the fact that there is a serious flaw in her character, 
which, in many of my friends’ eyes, would outweigh 
everything in her favor. She is a matrimonial harpy, 
and lives for little else than to find husbands for Faith 
and Sybil. Now, matchmaking ought to require a 
license from the State, just as much as the carrying 
of fire arms, for I fail to see why a person may, with 
impunity, wreck two lives, when, in the latter case, 
carelessness only involves injury to an individual. 
Mrs. Bellew finds an intrinsic merit in matrimony 
which justifies her in attacking the celibacy of every 


JANUARY 


17 


bachelor crossing her threshold, on behalf of her two 
“ olive branches,” who might be suitably left to grow 
alone for a few years before being grafted elsewhere. 
We owe more to the gardening propensities of Adam 
and Eve than is usually reckoned. 

Faith, the eldest of Mrs. Bellew’s girls, has the 
sweet and unselfish temperament which so often goes 
with brown eyes and a black bow in the hair. A model 
daughter, she is prepared to fall in with any of her 
masterful mother’s plans, and take a spouse with the 
same unquestioning belief in her parent’s competency 
and goodness of heart as in nursery days she received 
a box of bricks. Sybil, on the other hand, is one of 
those big, healthy girls, with a complexion that defies 
the arts of the toilet table, a manner that her friends 
describe as bright,” and her critics as ‘‘ boisterous,” 
and not an ounce of sentiment in her. 

Knowing Mrs. Bellew’s methods I kept wide awake 
the first night at Southlands, and soon discovered 
from the way in which his hostess drew him to her 
side throughout the evening, smiled sweetly when he 
upset the mint sauce over her flow*ered silk at dinner, 
and sent him into the hall with Faith while the rest 
of us thought of something, animal, vegetable, or 
mineral,” that Major Griffiths was her prospective 
victim. The Major gave the impression that he had 
been born with a grape in his mouth and vine leaves 
in his hair; not so much from what he said, though 
that was worth listening to after the ladies had left 
the room, but from what he did with the various vint- 
ages that appeared in generous sequence. He had 
reached that age when every mother thought he was 
bound to succumb to the charms of her own child, and 
he was what a Socialist orator would have called one 


18 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


of the idle rich.” His fellow clubmen were divided 
on the point as to whether Griffiths was single from 
choice, or from the disillusionment of an unsuccessful 
affaire du coeur in his more active and romantic days, 
but whatever the cause which had made shipwreck 
of his domestic ideals, leaving him at forty-five a dere- 
lict, to the casual observer his mental outlook was 
twofold. When he was not engaged in thinking of 
his next meal, he was wondering how soon he could 
get a bridge four going. But Mrs. Bellew must have 
looked upon such a diagnosis as superficial, or else had 
had the benefit of a moment’s unguarded confidence 
from the Major on one of those occasions, such as tea 
and hot scones after a wet day’s shooting, or supper- 
time at a dance, when the soul of man is expansive 
and communicative. She, at all events, had no doubts 
about her and Faith’s capacity to capture that much- 
assaulted citadel, the Major’s heart. 

Once, in the long ago, Mrs. Bellew cherished the 
notion of a hopeless affection on my part for Sybil, 
a delusion founded largely, I am convinced, on my 
outspoken admiration for the latter’s prowess at center- 
half in a mixed hockey match against a neighboring 
house party. Sybil, still in the school-room, and with 
her hair flying wild, performed prodigies of skill on 
that particular occasion, and was largely instrumental 
for her side’s success, but earnest concentration has 
failed to recall any remembrance that I incriminated 
myself very deeply, or uttered sentiments which could 
have been construed into a pledge in a court of law, 
even with a jury of susceptible tradesmen ready to 
stretch every point of the evidence in order to show 
their sympathy with the fair plaintiff. A long course 
of flippancy on my part, however, has saved me from 


JANUARY 


19 


having Mrs. Bellew take the field in force against my 
inaction, because nothing is so effective in counter- 
acting the schemes of matchmaking chaperones as the 
assumption of an air of irresponsibility. The toils 
that would capture a lion are harmless to a mouse, and 
the social jester forms one of the congregation at the 
wedding of the man who takes himself seriously. But 
on the occasion of my visit last week to Southlands 
for tw’O balls, and a third shoot through the covers, I 
was compelled to see a good deal of Sybil, even at the 
risk of “ reviving old desires,'' as Omar Khayyam 
says, in certain quarters, for the simple reason that 
there was no other young woman disengaged to re- 
ceive my attentions. Griffiths was forced by the un- 
obtrusive yet effectual surveillance of Mrs. Bellew 
to dance attendance on Faith at a time of life when 
the last thing he wanted to do was to dance at all. 

Dolly Thurston, who, with her mother. Lady Susan, 
was also staying in the house, had already found a 
kindred soul in Clive Massey, still up at the 'Varsity 
and unable to resist the appeal which her soft fluffi- 
ness and gentle ways made to his young manhood, 
while he had roused the girl's sympathetic interest 
by his recital of episodes from his unhappy and murky 
past, a pastime in which youths of such a blameless 
type as Massey usually excel. Dolly shared each 
stand of Massey's during the cover shooting, played 
his accompaniments after tea, and challenged him to 
post-prandial picquet in the quietest corner of the back 
drawing-room. When Lady Susan took it into her 
head to unburden herself of the hopes and fears con- 
nected with the social future of her daughter, I was 
thoroughly competent to reassure her on that score. 
As Lady Susan was short-sighted, I didn’t feel justi- 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


SO 

fied in spoiling Dolly’s week by supporting my 
general proposition as to the girl’s ability to take care 
of herself, with a particular instance. Lady Susan, 
for all she talks about Dolly, knows very little con- 
cerning her, an ignorance she shares with several 
worldly matrons of my acquaintance. 

I did my best under the circumstances to please 
everybody. Sybil had supper and three dances with 
me at the Hunt Ball, I took her twice into dinner 
without a murmur, and read the Field from cover to 
cover so as to be more fully equipped with topics of 
conversation congenial to her cast of mind. In de- 
fiance of all my natural instincts, Massey was left in 
undisputed possession of Miss Thurston’s society. 
Moreover, I turned a deaf ear to the Major’s appeals 
that I should come to his assistance and take upon my 
shoulders a share of those obligations which the 
hostess had laid on his. 

“ Hanbury,” he said once, when he had outstayed 
the others in the smoking-room, “ you’d enjoy a talk 
with Miss Bellew ; she’s no end of a clever little thing.” 

‘‘ That’s why you are such pals,” I replied. “ Op- 
posite drawn to opposite.” 

Griffiths, who had buried his nose in his tumbler, 
turned a doleful face upon me at the conclusion of the 
draught. 

'M’m not a lady’s man,” he remarked. “Don’t 
understand ’em, or want to, but I can’t quite tell Mrs. 
Bellew that. I’d take it as very friendly, Hanbury, 
if you’d play up to the girl a bit, and knock any ideas 
out of the mother’s head”; and Griffiths mopped 
his fiery face with a fiery bandanna. 

I refused to undertake such a task, not out of 
an unfriendly spirit to Griffiths — for I had the same 


JANUARY 


21 


feeling for him that I have for a newly born infant, 
genuine pity that such helpless innocence has been cast 
on a rough world — but because I was on my good be- 
havior while under Mr. Bellew’s roof. His high 
pheasants are not to be lightly cast away out of quix- 
otic sympathy for one of his wife^s victims. 

As the week dragged on — I use the word 

dragged '' advisedly, for “ duty,'' in spite of the 
many laudatory attributes the evangelists and poets 
endow it with, is essentially its own reward, no “ purse 
of fifty sovs." being added where it is concerned — I 
wished myself back in London — London, which held 
Cynthia Cochrane, George Burn, the Club, and all 
the unhallowed delights of bachelorhood, and away 
from Southlands with its managing mother, and its 
managed daughters, Griffiths, who drew the best stand 
of the best drive of the best day, and then missed the 
rocketing birds because he felt so down on his luck, 
as he explained to me later, Massey, who monopolized 
the really nice girl of the party without any regard for 
his seniors' points of view. An English country 
house, ‘‘ replete with every modern convenience," as 
the advertisements describe it, and surrounded by 
well-stocked covers, is less than nothing if the com- 
pany assembled in it is composed of inharmonious 
elements, and inharmonious they certainly were at 
Southlands last week. I might have left without a 
single pleasant memory other than the wine and cigars, 
had I not on the fifth day, while sitting with the rest 
in the hall after lunch — that meal having been par- 
taken of indoors, owing to rain making outside sport 
impossible — taken occasion to draw attention to the 
gloom on Major Griffiths' face. 

‘‘Did you see a ghost last night?" demanded 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Clive Massey. The Major had — the ghost of his dead 
peace of mind — ^but no one thought of that. 

Lady Susan surveyed the shrinking soldier through 
her lorgnon. Griffiths is a modest man, and the inter- 
est he was arousing effectually sealed his lips. I was 
minded to offer some plausible explanation of his 
silence. 

I turned to Lady Susan. 

“ The Major has a guilty conscience. As you make 
yo.ur bed, so must you lie upon it.” 

“ I regard that remark as extremely indelicate,” 
replied the lady so addressed, with hauteur. ‘‘ I am 
not accustomed, Mr. Hanbury, to make beds.” 

“ You mistake me,” I rejoined hastily, and stumbled 
from bad to worse, “ I was referring to the Major's 
bed.” 

“ That will do ! ” Lady Susan drew herself up with 
all the frigid dignity at her command. “I am not 
concerned in the slightest with Major Griffiths' prep- 
arations for the night. You have forgotten your- 
self, Mr. Hanbury.” 

After which, of course, I was in disgrace with the 
chaperones. As I might as well be hanged for a sheep 
as for a lamb — ^though there's not much lamb about 
Lady Susan — I became reckless, and started ‘‘ fives ” 
on the billiard table until a sheet of plate glass had 
been broken, and the ivory balls chipped in several 
places. Then I instigated the Major to refuse Faith’s 
invitation to learn a new Patience, and ensconced him 
peacefully with Ruff's Guide to the Turf, while Dolly 
Thurston and I played cat’s-cradle to the huge dis- 
gust of Massey, who was too unsophisticated to con- 
ceal his feelings, whereas you might put me on the 
rack, and I would wear the same expression that I 


JANUARY 


do at a performance of Wagner. But my crowning 
indiscretion came after a dinner at which the Major 
and I broke all records of joviality, owing to our being 
temporarily freed from our respective encumbrances, 
and reveling instead in the smiles, he of Sybil with 
her sporting tastes, I of Dolly, who was punishing 
Massey for a display of jealousy by appreciation of my 
vein of humor. When the male element was left to 
itself and Mr. Bellew’s cigars, the Major mixed what 
he called a “ stirrup cup out of numerous liqueurs, 
and fortified by this I marched into the hall at 10.15 
p. M. and proposed ‘Mark room,’’ a game I have 
never found to fail as a source of innocent amusement. 
It takes the form of clearing the largest available room 
of superfluous furniture, extinguishing every ray of 
light in it, and then setting the players in their stock- 
inged feet to escape noiselessly without being caught 
by one of their number, who delays his entrance in 
the first instance into the room until the others shall 
have concealed themselves in any recess that strikes 
the individual fancy. The last person caught takes 
on the duty of catcher in the next round. 

In spite of the remonstrances of the chaperones 
against so terrifying a form of entertainment, the 
Major was appointed catcher by general acclamation. 
His heavy breathing, as he crept round and round the 
big central table of the dining-room, cleared of its 
appointments for the purpose, in pursuit of a faintly 
rustling petticoat, materially assisted the intended vic- 
tims. Then he could be heard swearing softly to him- 
self as he ran from the sideboard into a screen, and 
thence cannoned off into the fire-irons, and his prog- 
ress was so audible that every one eluded his clutch 
save myself, who was preoccupied with my efforts to 


24 * 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


solve the problem whose hand it was I had found my- 
self holding for a brief period behind the window cur- 
tains. My turn as catcher ended in disaster and dis- 
grace, for I adopted the original plan of taking up my 
position full length under the table, from which point 
of vantage I seized the first available ankle. There 
was a scream and a plunging noise, followed by a con- 
fused uproar, during which, with the rushing as of a 
mighty wind, the whole human contents of the room 
fled from all points of the compass into the hall, to be 
met by the hostile public opinion of the outraged 
mothers, since the spoil of my ingenuous tactics proved 
to be Clive Massey, who, taking advantage of the op- 
portunities offered by the game to make his peace with 
Dolly Thurston, was interrupted by my assault at an 
inopportune moment, and found himself unable to 
avoid dragging her to the ground. 

We failed to clear ourselves of the suspicions rest- 
ing on us, individually and collectively. Dolly was 
packed off to bed like a naughty child, the Bellew girls 
came under their mother’s displeasure for no other 
reason I could see than that they had not given cause 
for anxiety, and Clive and I were fixed with the cold- 
est looks, he because he was ineligible, and I for hav- 
ing dared to originate so compromising a game. 
Griffiths alone had indulgence extended to him, an 
illustration of the irony of fate, since he, above every- 
thing else, was anxious to get into Mrs. Bellew’s bad 
books rather than endure the baleful geniality, which 
even his slow intuition told him boded no good for his 
continued independence. The sole satisfactory result 
traceable to the night’s doings was the healing of the 
breach between Massey and myself, an outcome of his 
gratitude to me for giving him a chance of letting 


JANUARY 


^5 


bygones be bygones/’ I showed my intention of 
taking an interest in the affairs of a sportsman like 
himself by inviting him to look me up in Jermyn Street 
on his return to town. 

Clive Massey is one of those fresh, clean-limbed 
Englishmen, a sight of whom makes one feel proud 
to be their fellow countrymen. The product of public 
school and University, he and his kind dance, shoot, 
and hunt through life if the paternal income allows. 
If it doesn’t, they gravitate into the Indian native cav- 
alry, or the South African mounted police, or turn 
their hands to any job they can find in any country on 
the globe. They have few brains of the quality en- 
abling them to pass examinations, and no ambitions, 
but put them in a tight place in an outpost of civiliza- 
tion, and they extricate themselves, and those depend- 
ing on them, with a robust common sense and an in- 
nate courage and resourcefulness that only emerge 
from beneath their stolidity and reserve under the 
stress of danger. All the pedagogues in the length 
and breadth of England, relying on the arts and en- 
ticements of written and oral questions, are powerless 
to extract from Massey & Co. any knowledge of the 
kind that would seat them in Whitehall at home, or 
in official posts abroad. Commercially their virtues 
are valueless, imperially and socially they are beyond 
price. Not that Massey will ever feel the absence 
of money-making talent. He is a ward of Chancery, 
with a substantial property accumulating, under care- 
ful and thrifty management, fat revenues against the 
day when he will come into his own, and, in the eyes 
of the law, reach man’s estate. 

I never wish for a better companion at dinner than 


26 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


the fellow. He begins the meal with enthusiasm, and 
continues on that note till the end, unlike some men I 
know who get anecdotal, morose, or sleepy, when they 
have disposed of the last course. But Massey so bub- 
bles over with la joie de vivrc, et de la bonne cuisine 
that he rouses the whole table to action. He possesses 
a healthy zest for amusement, and a frank enthusiasm 
for the enjoyments that life holds out to him, with a 
complete absence of that self-conscious cynicism that 
too often marks and mars the Oxford man. His com- 
pany unseats black care from behind the horseman’s 
back, and drives misogynists to seek human friend- 
ship, and rejected lovers to try their fate again. 

I speak from recent experience, because he was my 
guest only the other night, having kept me to the in- 
vitation extended casually at Southlands as soon as 
he conveniently could, for I found, when he turned up, 
resplendent in a white waistcoat, that he had only 
been in town two days and was due back in Oxford 
on the morrow. He was so eager to keep the tryst that 
he arrived while I was completing my toilet, but his 
punctuality allowed me to take a hint from his cos- 
tume, and discard the smoking jacket I had contem- 
plated for full dress. I can read the signs of the times 
as well as any one, and Massey’s general “ get up ” 
spelled two words, and two words only — ‘‘The Em- 
pire.” I know better than to confine an undergraduate 
indoors after 9.30 p. M., especially when his Alma 
Mater will claim him within twenty-four hours. 

Dinner provided the usual topics, the whereabouts 
of mutual friends, athletics, sport, and musical comedy. 
Mentally I went back ten years and saw myself again 
as a healthy animal, determined to have a good time 
while I was young, filled with a vague and restless 


JANUARY 


n 


curiosity concerning the world outside the University, 
which, from the magic environment of Oxford, ap- 
peared as through a glass darkly/’ The gray walls 
and clustering pinnacles of that enchanted city once 
more surrounded me as I listened to Massey’s cheerful 
chatter about the chances of the Boat Race, the beauty 
of the waitress in the Cozy Corner ” tearooms at 
Carfax, the best place to dine in town for 3s, 6d., and 
so on. He was prepared to test any and every thing 
in his search for what he called ‘‘ Life,” and I gradu- 
ally gathered that he thought I might be instrumental 
in opening some doors for him. I felt so grateful for 
the sense of lightheartedness he inspired in me that 
I let him pursue his conversational thread unchecked, 
till, just when I had brewed the coffee in a scientific 
glass crucible that makes excellent stuff when it doesn’t 
burst in the process, and fixed him up with a cigar 
about a foot long, he remarked abruptly, “ I suppose 
you know a lot of people, Hanbury? I don’t mean 
our sort, but actors, singers, and all that lot?” 

“ I meet them sometimes,” I said carelessly. 

‘‘They’re awfully interesting, aren’t they?” 

“ Some of them are amusing enough.” 

Massey took the plunge. “ You might introduce 
me, if you run across any when I’m around.” 

“ I’ll do anything I can, in my small way, of course,” 
I replied. “When you mention actors, I conclude 
you mean the female of the species.” 

“Anything that comes along will suit me,” was 
Massey’s guarded reply, but I could see he was 
pleased. It was my turn to cross-examine him. 

“ You seemed to be having a good time at the 
Bellews’. Miss Thurston’s attractive, don’t you 
think?” 


28 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Miss Thurston’s admirer blew a smoke ring, but 
vouchsafed no reply. 

She’s supposed to be half engaged to her cousin,” 
I went on, with studied calm. “ That’s the worst of 
relatives, they start at an unfair advantage with the 
use of the Christian name. It’s to be hoped in her 
case the man won’t foreclose on his mortgage just 
yet.” 

Massey’s cigar ash dropped on his trousers. Other- 
wise he displayed commendable self-control. 

That yarn’s not true,” he said. Miss Thurston 
told me herself that she had never cared for anybody, 
and that she would only marry some one she re- 
spected.” 

“You’ve known her a long time?” I queried, with 
a trace of malice. 

“ No, not so very long,” he reluctantly confessed. 
“ In fact, I met her at Southlands for the first time, 
but we’re the best of pals now. I don’t take much to 
the mother, though.” 

The picture of the lover in Keats’ “ Ode on a Gre- 
cian Urn ” rose before me. “ Forever wilt thou love, 
and she be fair ! ” I quoted under my breath, with this 
mental addition, “ and like him you’ll never get any 
forrader, my friend.” Massey, under the combined 
influence of dinner, tobacco, and sentiment, had sunk 
into reverie, in which doubtless he was rehearsing the 
role of Young Lochinvar, a reverie which I forbore 
to shatter. Romantic dreams such as his are too fra- 
grant and rare to be lightly dispelled by the cold 
common sense of the worldly-wise. I could have en- 
lightened him as to his ladylove’s inconstancy in the 
past, and exposed the absence of accurate perspective 
in her fancy picture of her future husband. But I 


JANUARY 


29 


refrained. Instead I gave my guest a quarter of an 
hour’s grace, and then took him along to his chosen 
music hall, where a humorous fellow on the stage was 
breaking plates by the score. The sight restored Mas- 
sey to his true self; he threw off a gravity unnatural 
to him, and dragged me up and down the promenade 
during half the ballet, greeting everybody by their 
Christian names, and generally behaving as though 
he were an admiral on his own quarter-deck. 

On our parting he assured me I was the best fellow 
he had ever met, and with the glow of this unsought- 
for compliment warming the cockles of my heart, I 
ended the second stage of a friendship that promised 
me instruction and entertainment. 




FEBRUARY 


Marriage is to me apostasy, profanation of the sanctuary of my 
soul, violation of my manhood, sale of my birthright, shame- 
ful surrender, iptominious capitulation, acceptance of defeat. 
1 shall decay like a thing that has served its purpose, and 
is done with; I shall change from a man with a future to a 
man with a past. . . .The young men will scorn me as one 
who has sold out; to the women I, who have always been an 
enigma and a possibility, shall be merely somebody else’s 
property — and damaged goods at that; a second-hand man 
at best /’ — Bernard Shaw, “Man and Superman,” Act IV. 


FEBRUARY 


A Citizen of Bohemia — Lady Fullard plays the part 
of Candid Friend — Dnlcie and Mrs, Mallow hold 
their own — A Theatrical Ball 

I WAS having an argument to-day with Haines 
about Bohemianism. He said that a Bohemian 
was a blighter who never washed, ate with his 
fingers, and let his hair grow as long as Samson’s.’’ 

Haines is a master of forcible and picturesque 
speech, and as he warmed to his work he quite sur- 
passed himself. 

“ I know the fellows,” he continued. ** They slouch 
about Soho with seedy squash hats, and seedier fur 
overcoats which they pinched from the last doss-house 
they slept in, looking like a mixture of Svengali and a 
ragpicker. When they feel hungry they drink absinthe, 
when they want money they write verses, or scrape a 
violin, with a sickly smile on their unshaven faces. I 
always give the chaps a wide berth.” 

I sometimes think it’s a pity that Archie Haines is 
a stockbroker, and not a leader writer. In the latter 
capacity he could make any Minister of Government 
uncomfortable by the vigor of his style and the force 
of his epithets. I told Haines that he was merely 
hanging a dog that had been given a bad name, and 
that his picture was entirely insular and fantastic. 
Bohemianism, I tried to show him, was a point of 
view, and not a question of dress or personal habits. 
True Bohemianism is a spirit of romance which turns 
even the ugliest environment into '' a rose-red city^ 
33 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


S4i 

half as old as time ” ; a sense of eternal youth gilding 
the present and future with the glow of radiant hope ; 
a kinship with those who add to the common stock of 
gayety, and good fellowship; a standard of artistic 
excellence which admits of no compromise in its ideals 
— in short, a formula of life and conduct, complete 
and satisfying. I’m afraid, however, that Haines re- 
mained unconvinced. 

What started the discussion was the fact that, 
lunching in “ The Cock ” on Monday, I met Steward. 
After a Fleet Street crawl I had turned into the old 
place, settled myself behind one of the oak partitions, 
ordered the steak and kidney pudding that the habi- 
tues called for, and then, casting a look around at my 
neighbors, had seen the fellow grinning at me. 
Steward and I were sub-editors on the Evening Star 
together for six months in my newspaper days. In 
appearance he is about thirty-five years old, small, 
and pallid featured, with coal-black hair falling in all 
directions, piercing eyes masked behind heavy-rimmed 
spectacles, and a general air of activity and determina- 
tion. He began life selling papers, got a reputation 
as a smart lad, and was put in charge of the telephones 
at a newspaper office, a job he varied by fetching copy 
from the reporting staff at the Law Courts. A night 
school gave him a fair grounding of knowledge, which 
he supplemented by voracious reading until he knew" 
the classical authors nearly by heart, and had accumu- 
lated a vast store of general information. Then he 
took to bringing in articles of various kinds of such 
high quality that they finally attracted the attention of 
the editor in chief, who promoted him first to the po- 
sition of a reporter, and then to th^ “ desk,” as a 
sub-editor, 


FEBRUARY 


35 


Having passed all his existence with the smell of 
printer’s ink in his nostrils. Steward had the qualities 
of a journalist implanted in him, and his quickness of 
judgment and keen sense of the practical enabled 
him to turn his talents to the best advantage. He 
did some amazing things in the way of ‘‘ scoops ” 
while I was his colleague. His headlines were mas- 
terpieces of pithy compression, and he could fill the 
least inspired “ copy ” with a sparkle and dash that 
made it the most attractive item on the page. He 
would scent in a three-line paragraph from an un- 
known correspondent the story of the week. I shall 
never forget how one of the other “ subs ” took a 
telephone message about a body being found in a box 
in a London suburb, and was proceeding to make it 
into a small paragraph, when Steward, whose atten- 
tion had somehow been drawn to the matter, pounced 
upon the thing and from sheer instinct “ splashed ” 
the story on the last edition, gave it a bill, and sent 
out two reporters posthaste. Next day we had an 
exclusive column and a half of what proved to be the 
criminal cause celehre of the year. 

But above all. Steward never lost his head in one 
of the unforeseen crises that ever and again disturb 
editorial method and routine, and discover the weak 
places in the staff’s ability to deal with emergencies. 
When a decision, in all probability involving war 
between England and another Power, came unex- 
pectedly into the office. Steward’s coolness communi- 
cated itself to every one, from the man on the “ stone” 
to the boy at the tape. He stopped the printing 
machines on the instant, although the elaborate time- 
table and organization for catching the trains over 
the country was thereby thrown out of gear, and him- 


36 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


self sent out, line by line, to the waiting* compositors 
a masterly resume of the previous negotiations, and a 
summary of what the news meant to Europe. To the 
wild messages that came from the publishing depart- 
ment as to the meaning of the sudden dislocation of 
the day’s arrangements. Steward gave replies that 
admitted of no questioning. The prestige and cir- 
culation of the Evening Star alike profited by the 
judgment displayed. So brilliant a journalist as 
Steward is certain to occupy an important editorial 
chair before long. 

But besides all this. Steward is a Bohemian to his 
finger-tips, by virtue of his intention to live his own 
life untrammeled by the conventional environment 
beloved of Englishmen, to which end he creates an 
atmosphere of his own in which to “ see visions and 
dream dreams.” A contemporary of mine at Oxford 
got the reputation of being a Bohemian because he 
usually sat in a dressing-gown, drank Benedictine 
after ‘‘ Hall,” read Verlaine, and possessed an en- 
graving of the “ Blessed Damozel.” Steward is not 
cast in that crude image. There is a robust common 
sense about his unconventionality which keeps him 
out of the blind alleys of morbid introspection, and 
sensualism, in which so many wander who profess 
Bohemianism either as an intellectual pose, or to 
excuse the gratification of vicious tastes. At his flat 
in Chancery Lane, in the only club he frequents, ‘‘ The 
Savage,” or in the particular restaurant in Rupert 
Street, Soho, where he may be found nightly. Steward 
wears the nimbus of the social saint. He radiates wit 
and originality, and stimulates even in his silences. 
To him no man is common or unclean, and no one’s 
credentials for friendship are questioned who gives as 


FEBRUARY 


37 


good measure as he receives, and when he is piped to, 
dances, when mourned to, weeps. The “ chucker-out ” 
at a West End music hall, the ring steward of an 
East End boxing-saloon, an Undersecretary of 
State, a cocktail mixer in an American bar, and the 
author of the most valuable copyright in Europe, are 
all Steward’s friends. He is a genuine citizen of Bo- 
hemia. If there is a power which can strike off the 
fetters of hypocrisy and unctuous virtue in which 
Imagination and Thought are confined, Steward 
wields it. If there is an antidote to the compound of 
scandal and sport with which Society poisons its 
votaries. Steward can supply it. His presence is a 
tonic, and he knows the haunts and companions to 
banish dull care and duller ignorance. 

As Steward and myself ate our steak pudding and 
treacle roll he told me how he had come to write the 
lyrics for the new ‘‘Alcazar” musical play. The Bird 
in the Bush, the piece, by the way, in which Cynthia 
Cochrane made her debut under Mason’s manage- 
ment. One of the journalist’s gifts is the writing of 
light verse, and the Evening Star rarely appears with- 
out a neat specimen of his talent on a topic of the day. 
Mason, always on the lookout for fresh talent to keep 
the sacred lamp of burlesque burning, suggested to 
Steward, whose acquaintance he had made at a Sav- 
age Club Saturday night, that he should try his hand 
at some of the songs for the forthcoming piece, and 
so pleased was he with the offspring of Steward’s 
muse, that he handed over the entire job to my friend, 
with the result that the latter is reaping the golden 
harvest which is the guerdon of successful authorship 
in that sphere. The best of Steward’s fancies, and 
one which has already captivated play-going London, 


38 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


is the song sung by the ‘‘ Star’' to the limelight man. 
It runs as follows: 

In the morning I am peevish, with my nerves all on the jar. 

From the shopping and the popping in and out my rnotor car. 

In the afternoon I’ve problems that preoccupy my mind — 

Is my figure quite de rigueur, are my curls all right behind? 

In the dusk a quiet rubber will my restless soul content; 

What with playing and with paying there’s no time for sentiment ! 
But at night I move enraptured in your limelight’s ardent glare, 
And my passion is a fashion that I beg of you to share. 

In the daylight I am thinking of my beauty’s swift decay. 

And “ affection ” and “ complexion ” get in one another’s way. 

In the twilight I am pensive, but it’s not to do with love; 

“ Shall I dine in silk or satin?” is the thought all thoughts above. 
In the lamplight I am troubled by a lot of different things : 

My digestion, Bertie’s question — “ Will you have the furs or 
rings ? ” 

In the limelight you may sue me, for my heart’s no longer stone. 
If your notion is devotion. I’ll be yours and yours alone. 


At the conclusion a terrific crash indicates that the 
object of the appeal has thrown discretion and duty to 
the winds and jumped down from his perch in the 
wings. A second later a stage hand rushes frantically 
forward and clasps the leading lady in an embrace, 
showing that her infatuation is returned. On the first 
night the success of the play was secured from that 
dramatic moment. 

Another original feature is the Limerick King, 
whose entrance is marked by a ballad beginning as 
follows : 

My name is O’Shaughnessy Brown, 

I own a large slice of the town. 

My ample resources 
Of motors and horses 
Confer on me social renown. 

I’ve a yacht — tho’ I can’t stand the sea; 

I’ve a wife — tho’ we never agree; 

I’ve a son in the Guards, 

Tho’ his losses at cards 
Would pauperize all men but me. 


FEBRUARY 


59 


The papers are full of my name. 

My portraits are never the same: 

I’m taken on Friday 
With a duchess beside me; 

On Monday I pose with Hall Caine! 

The gentleman goes on to tell how he made his vast 
fortune by winning limerick competitions. The hold 
that the rhyming craze has on him. is shown by the 
fact that he never opens his mouth in the course of 
the play without couching his remarks in the familiar 
meter which has brought him wealth. 

Steward gave me to understand that he had had a 
difficult task during rehearsals owing to the mutually 
conflicting views as to the ‘‘ business ” held by Mason, 
the composer of the music, and the leading perform- 
ers, male and female. But Steward was determined 
to have his own way, and neither the tears of the 
ladies, nor the declamations of the men proved effect- 
ive in moving him from the position he took up. 

Another item that I gleaned during lunch at the 
‘‘ Cock ’’ was that Mason is giving a Shrove Tuesday 
dance for the members of his company to cheer things 
up before Lent, and Steward wants me to go as his 
guest. I have long since cut my wisdom-teeth on the 
Stage and its surroundings, but theatrical hops ” are 
usually amusing, and I have a mind to take Massey 
with me and try the “ safety in numbers theory on 
his present infatuation for Dolly Thurston. 

People never seem able to understand what I do with 
myself in town. If a man doesn’t follow a hall-marked 
profession, such as soldiering, ‘‘ bridge,” or driving a 
motor, they always imagine that he possesses a large 
income and a taste for dissipation. When I told Mrs. 
Kyles that I wrote things,” she said Really, how 


40 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


interesting/’ in a tone expressive of profound skep- 
ticism. But one must make allowances for Mrs. 

K , since she has been soured by her daughter 

Muriel, who, having “ missed her market,” as the say- 
ing is, has taken up philanthropy as an alternative 
occupation, and is rather trying at home. 

It did surprise me, however, that Lady Fullard 
should also harbor suspicions as to my way of life. 
Lady Fullard is the only one of my people’s friends 
whom I have adopted as mine. Her house forms a 
sanctuary from social creditors, and her astringent 
remarks act as a tonic when my nervous system is ex- 
hausted by work and worry. We mutually respect 
each other, without having any tastes in common, for 
what interests can be shared by two people one of 
whom ends her day (under doctor’s orders) at an 
hour when the other is just beginning his? 

‘‘Don’t you get very tired of doing nothing? ” she 
inquired, after having rather treacherously asked me 
to tea. 

“You cruelly misjudge me. Lady Fullard,” I pro- 
tested, “ I’m a hard-working fellow. Why, this week 
I’ve done a column on ‘How to Crease Trousers’ 
for the fashion page of the Whirlwind ; ‘ Delia in the 
Cowshed ’ for the Saturday Jujube; and ‘ Luncheon 
as a Fine Art ’ in the Parthenon; far more exhausting 
brain work, mind you, than engrossing deeds in a 
solicitor’s office, or pretending at being ‘ something in 
the City ’ when one is really nothing.” 

Lady Fullard did not seem impressed. 

“Writing,” she said in those cold, measured tones 
that always curdle my blood, “ is merely another name 
for idleness. What you want, Mr. Hanbury, is to 
find a nice, sensible girl and settle down. It’s very 


FEBRUARY 


41 


bad for a young man to wait too long. He gets 
spoiled and becomes unfit to make a good husband.” 

“ Father ” I broke out, but checked myself, as 

I realized that though the voice was the voice of Jacob, 
the hands were the hands of Lady Fullard. 

“ I am trying to make myself worthy,” I continued 
nervously, ‘‘ of that ordeal — ideal, I mean, — ^but it is 
bound to be a long process. Fm sorry you don't think 
much of my efforts.” 

‘‘ I’ve been twice to the Savoy lately, Mr. Han- 

bury ” Lady Fullard began, and my hopes beat 

high that this imposing matron was about to make a 
dramatic confession of frailty. 

I understand,” I interrupted, in order to soften the 
remorse I knew she must be feeling ; ‘‘ but let him who 
is without offense cast the first stone.” 

Lady Fullard took no more notice of my charitable 
intervention than to repeat her words. 

‘‘ I’ve been twice to the Savoy lately, and I’ve seen 
you there both times. Is that what you call making 
an effort?” 

It took me a minute to recover from the shock of 
Lady Fullard’s oxymoron. 

‘‘Well, one must accept some invitations,” I re- 
torted, “ and the Thurstons have asked me so often.” 

“ But on the last occasion you were alone with Mr. 
Haines.” 

“ I was giving him advice.” 

“ Giving him fiddlesticks,” Lady Fullard snorted. 
“ There was a Covent Garden ball that night.” 

“ Really, I didn’t see you there,” I said, with well- 
simulated surprise. “Which box were you in? 
Surely you were not the lady in the black domino who 
won a prize for the cake walk ? 


43 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Lady Fullard grew scarlet. 

“ Sir John told me what function you were bound 
for, Mr. Hanbury.'^ 

“ Could you persuade him to give a display of 
thought reading at the Cripples' Fete?" I queried. 

Sir John must have wonderful powers of second 
sight, for, as a matter of fact, I did look in to see an 
old friend of the family. The fact is. Lady Fullard, 
Fm giving myself every opportunity of finding out 
how unsatisfactory the world is for the unmarried 
man, and how none of its pleasures can equal those of 
home, sweet home. I go to the Savoy in order to 
persuade my stubborn bachelor instinct that the dinner 
there isn't half as good as what I might expect from 
a Kensington cook. I pay a visit to the stalls at a 
musical comedy so that I may see for myself how 
much nicer it would be to spend the evening by my 
own fireside in a room full of smoke from a defective 
grate, and my wife explaining to me how she can't 
possibly dress on 120 pounds a year." 

‘‘ When a young man," said my hostess, breaking in 
on my defense, ‘‘who is obviously fond of feminine 
society, — you needn’t pretend to be horrified ! — makes 
mock of the solemnities of the married state, it usually 
means that there is a woman ineligible for presenta- 
tion at Court occupying his attention.” 

Lady Fullard forestalled a violent outbreak on her 
hearer’s part by raising her hand. “You don't re- 
quire to protest your innocence, Mr. Hanbury. But 
you can't go on enjoying yourself forever.” 

Woman's intuition is man's worst enemy. Like a 
masked battery it makes his position untenable be- 
fore ever he knows that there is a foe about. For a 
quick-witted person, I was fairly nonplused. It was 


FEBRUARY 


43 


only the thought of Cynthia Cochrane that enabled 
me to recover my self-control. 

‘‘I’m not enjoying myself,” I stammered, “not 
here, at any rate. I imagined you had a better opin- 
ion of me. Lady Fullard, than to suspect me of such 
conduct as you have hinted at, and for which vicious 
hypocrisy is the only name.” 

To cover my tracks I prepared to launch out on a 
virtuous homily. Lady Fullard cut me short. 

“ I suspect you of nothing that I don’t expect from 
other men. You’re all alike!” 

“You mustn’t judge us all from Sir John’s stand- 
ard,” I said, determined to get some of my own back. 

“ I prefer not to discuss my husband.” Lady Ful- 
lard’s tones enforced obedience. 

Sir John, for all I knew, might have had a blame- 
less past, but I wasn’t going to let his wife make grave 
insinuations against myself, and then ride scathless 
away on the high horse of marital loyalty so soon as 
reprisals were attempted. 

“ It is more Christian,” I admitted sympathetically, 
“ to let bygones be bygones. Where we cannot speak 
well of a reputation we should hold our tongues about 
it, but I’m afraid the world, our world ” — I drawled 
my remarks with luscious emphasis — “ isn’t so chari- 
table as you, dear Lady Fullard ! ” 

Lady Fullard’s hand trembled as she handled the 
tea things. If I had not known she had been well 
brought up I should have ducked to avoid the silver 
kettle being flung at my head. Lest primeval instinct 
should break through the thin veneer of civilization, 
which is all that separates any one of us from our 
primitive ancestors, I hurriedly continued — 

“May I bring Mr. George Burn to see you? It 


44 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


would do him so much good to have the benefit of 
what you have just been telling me — the bit about 
scoffing at marriage meaning a tea-shop girl in the 
background. He stands particularly in need of words 
of warning.’’ 

Lady Fullard glanced at me with baffled fury. 

“ I have heard of Mr. Burn as an idle young man 
for whom Satan finds more than the usual amount of 
mischief.” 

I don’t know where you got your information 
about Satan and his Unemployed Scheme,” I said, 
with a warmth of feeling I made no attempt to con- 
ceal, ‘‘but you’ve been totally misinformed about 
George Burn. He’s the busiest fellow I know. Why, 
he gets through more tete-a-tetes than any three 
bachelors in Mayfair. What’s the matter?” 

The clouds of displeasure had lifted from Lady Ful- 
lard’s face, and she was smiling. 

“One can’t be angry with you,” she began in an 
indulgent voice. “You’re inimitable. I heard about 
you at the Bellews’.” 

“ What did you hear about me ? ” 

“Miss Thurston was telling me how badly you 
behaved.” 

Dolly Thurston slandering me behind my back, and 
after I’d perjured myself to Lady Susan by telling her 
that her daughter was really serious-minded and that 
it was her partners who were responsible for that 
growing flightiness which her mother deplored — Dolly 
who would make a Trappist monk break his vow of 
silence by her naughtiness ! 

“ Miss Thurston doesn’t know what good behavior 
is,” I said, with quiet dignity, “and I haven’t time to 
teach her. But I would place no reliance on the 


FEBRUARY 


45 


words of a young lady who turns the head of an 
undergraduate by giving him six dances as well as 
supper, corresponds with half the subalterns in the 
Guards, and cries until she is allowed a black evening 
frock.” 

You seem to take a great interest in Miss Thurs- 
ton’s affairs,” was Lady Fullard’s comment. 

“ I am concerned with her moral character only,” I 
replied. ‘‘ I don’t expect gratitude, but I did think 
she spoke the truth.” 

Lady Fullard made a gesture of annoyance. 

“ I’ve no patience with the young people of to-day. 
One’s as bad as the other. Miss Thurston’s a flirt 
and you are a philanderer, Mr. Hanbury. You’ll suit 
one another admirably. Must you be going? Come 
in when you want any more lectures ! ” 

I had risen at the moment that Lady Fullard de- 
livered herself of her amazing assumption. I am 
tolerably placid and amiable, but when the elderly 
wife of a knight, whose sharp tongue has earned a 
well-deserved unpopularity, and whose relations with 
her husband are notoriously humdrum, has the au- 
dacity to couple my name with that of a flighty and un- 
truthful minx, rpy patience is exhausted. I said good- 
by to Lady Fullard in tones suggestive of wounded 
pride. It will take a great deal more than an invita- 
tion to tea to make me darken her doors again. 


The first intimation I received that my mother had 
come up to town for a few days’ shopping, bringing 
my sister Dulcie with her, was a note asking me to 
bring a man to dine at the Craven Hotel with them. 
As I am nothing if not prompt, I drew the Club at tea- 


46 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


time and got hold of George Burn. I thought it 
would stimulate Dulcie to meet the real thing for once, 
George being emphatically one of those fellows whom, 
from some attraction indefinable and indeed inexplic- 
able to the other members of his sex, no woman seems 
able to resist. Whether it is that he accords each one 
of them a deferential and admiring homage which 
makes his acquaintanceship a precious possession, to 
be guarded, if possible, from the rest of the world, 
whether he has been granted an insight into the mys- 
tery of the female mind and moods which places them 
at his mercy, or whether it is merely his good looks 
and the assured confidence with which he treats them, 
at any rate the fair creatures capitulate to him with- 
out any storming of their defenses on his part when 
to most of us they would oppose a stubborn resistance 
before the siege was raised, and the terms of sur- 
render concluded. Perhaps it is that the man strongly 
attracts women who is himself attracted by them, be- 
cause George is always in love, and with two or three 
damsels at a time. How he manages to prevent the 
strings of his various affaires from getting entangled 
I can’t think. He reminds me of a juggler who keeps 
half a dozen glass balls in the air simultaneously with- 
out letting one fall. I know for a fact that, at the 
present time, George has romances with Lady Lucy 
Goring, although the Countess of Henley would have 
a fit if she knew of it ; Kitty Denver, the latest heiress 
from Carlton House Terrace, and to marry nobody 

under a duke; Mrs. T , who has separated from 

her husband and keeps an electric face massage estab- 
lishment in Bond Street ; and the leading “ show girl ” 
at the '' Firefly ” Theater, the much-sought-after sup-* 
per companion of all the young “ bloods ” who are 


FEBRUARY 


47 


bent on taking the shortest cut to farming in Canada, 
or an appearance in the Bankruptcy Court. 

Dulcie deserves all that a brother can do for her. 
Her natural talents have lain fallow in the country 
amongst the chickens and dead leaves, that is all, but 
I have noticed on several occasions an aptitude for 
Society which should carry her far, if opportunity 
were to offer. It is because I backed George to draw 
out her undeveloped powers to the utmost that I in- 
vited him to meet my sister at dinner. Sure enough, 
I had no sooner introduced the pair than I saw with 
half an eye that Dulcie was going to be as amiable as 
she knew how, and very sweet she can be if she has 
any object to attain. When she wanted me to take 
her to Ascot last year, and get her vouchers for my 
club tent, she was all sunshine and smiles weeks be- 
fore. Another point in Dulcie’s favor is that she al- 
ways does one credit, since she has the wisdom to stick 
to the style that suits her, and not to adopt an un- 
becoming mode of dress for no other reason than that 
the Maison This and That has decreed it shall be 
“ the Fashion.” In a white muslin and a sash Dulcie’s 
artless simplicity is far more effective than if she were 
to adopt the expensive toilettes of London girls. The 
type that goes about in brilliant taffetas and satins, 
and spread-eagle hats, and puts great bunches of 
osprey feathers in its elaborate coiffures at night may 
be amusing for a bit, but in the course of nine seasons 
I have never met a man of judgment who contem- 
plated spending his life in its company. He will flirt 
and dance with it, talk with it in the Park on a fine 
evening, and act as its escort at a race-meeting or a 
play, but when it comes to marriage, he prefers the 
maiden whose ideals have not been withered by the 


48 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


breath of a London June, whose notion of domesticity 
is other than that of an endless round of country 
houses and fashionable restaurants, and whose modest 
extravagance is more in keeping with his income. 
The London bachelor may be self-indulgent, spoilt, 
cold-blooded — frame the indictment as strongly as 
you like — but he has the good sense to appreciate the 
virtues he does not possess, to know that a sinner 
should not mate with a sinner, but with a saint, and 
that while he will never be browbeaten and hen- 
pecked into affection and unselfishness, he can be 
turned into a model husband by innocence and devo- 
tion. 

Dulcie, in a pretty pink frock, with her dark hair 
free from all abominations of ribbons and roses, was 
an effective contrast to the overcurled and under- 
dressed damsels with whom George spends his time. 
From the moment that I saw her in the hall of the 
Craven I recognized that Dulcie was quite competent 
to hold her own, even against such a redoubtable foe as 
George. 

Besides ourselves there were the Ponting-Mallows, 
he an old friend of my people, a distinguished Indian 
official who had risen to be Lieutenant-Governor of 
his province, and who, just before leaving India on his 
pension, had married a lively little lady some thirty 
years his junior. 

The half-guinea dinner at the Craven is, in my 
humble opinion, the best in London. Mrs. Mallow, 
in black with silver round the corsage, and a bow to 
match half hidden in her hair, made it seem better 
than ever. I had often heard her described as ‘‘ such 
a dear,” though why her own sex should have des- 
ignated her thus, I couldn’t make out, since it seemed 


FEBRUARY 


49 


so much more appropriate the phrase should come 
from mine. Give a man or Avoman a good name and 
canonize them, and for Mrs. Ponting-Mallow the title 
must be a social gold mine, although I suspect she 
quarries a good deal besides precious metal out of it. 
My respected parents have always disapproved of her 
— not for any defensible reason, but because the lady 
has too much hair and too little waist — but Ponting- 
Mallow has been so lifelong a friend of theirs that 
they have been compelled to take the trimmings with 
the joint, and risk social indigestion. 

Conversation, in the ordinary sense of the term, 
was really superfluous with Mrs. Mallow. She put 
a three-volume novel into the movements of her eye- 
lashes as she took her soup, and the last act of a melo- 
drama was fully interpreted by the quiver of her lip 
as she conveyed to me, under cover of a babel of noise 
from surrounding tables, that she was misunderstood, 
a fact, as I assured her, the more remarkable in that 
she had expressive eyes. 

“ You men are so hard on us,’’ murmured the little 
lady, in the particular undertone which is patented 
for the transmission of sentiments to which the reply 
is prepaid. 

I took a gulp of champagne, heliographed for rein- 
forcements, and replied that her sex didn’t often give 
us the chance of being tender. 

‘‘ Do you really mean that ? ” asked the lady, lead- 
ing a black suit. 

Catching her eye I nearly revoked, but managed 
to discard. ‘‘ What do you think? ” 

“ That you shouldn’t say such things if you don’t 
mean them.” Mrs. Mallow was no novice at the 
game. 


50 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


I had to follow suit to the heart lying on the table. 
“ I mean just what you want me to.” 

Mrs. Mallow trumped what I regarded as my trick 
by a deep sigh. 

Before I had time to pay my losses, Mr. Mallow 
leaned across to his wife. 

Julia,” he asked, “ where did we get that linoleum 
for the pantry ? ” Evidently my mother and he were 
engrossed in details of household management. 

Our cards were effectually scattered. Still, as I 
was helping Julia Mallow into her cloak, I arranged 
to call and prescribe for her parrot, whose symptoms, 
disquieting to his mistress, appeared to me to point 
to habitual overfeeding. I saw Mrs. Mallow and her 
husband into their coupe with quite a sense of adven- 
ture, as I promised myself an intimate study at close 
quarters of an unusually fine specimen of the married 
minx. 

As I walked George down to the Club for a rubber, 
I listened for five minutes to a diatribe on the artificial- 
ity of London life, and the unsatisfactory nature of 
its female inhabitants, ending with a resolution on 
George’s part to settle down in a hunting county, and 
have done with the place once and for all. I mentally 
marked up one to Dulcie’s credit, and said ‘‘Yes” 
and “No” as my companion’s pauses and intonation 
seemed to demand them. About Mrs. Mallow I kept 
my own counsel. George’s sense of property is un- 
developed, and he has a poacher’s instincts. 

“ My dear H , 

“ Mason will be delighted if yoti will bring 
your friend Massey along on Tuesday. We fore- 


FEBRUARY 


51 


gather at Midnight, and our programme will 
be as follows — 

12 p.m. Stirrup cups. 

12.5 ‘ The mazy.’' 

I. Refresh the inner man and woman. 

Consomme en tasse. 

Filets de sole frits. 

Ponlets en cocotte. 

Cailles. 

Glaces. 

Cafe noir. 

Veuve Clicquot. 1900 . Magnums. 

2.15. Cake Walk Competition, for a diamond 
bracelet and gold cigarette case, pre- 
sented by Arthur Mason, Esq., J.P. 

2.45. Speeches and thanks by the winner and 
her partner. 

2.47. Loud and prolonged applause by the 
audience. 

2.50. Ejection of the ‘ gentleman ’ who throws 
rolls under the impression that they 
are confetti. 

3. ‘The Lancers.’ 

3.30. Sweep up the debris, which includes a 
‘ transformation,’ four sets of ‘ pin- 
curls,’ one lock of golden hair, one 
black ‘ditto,’ one dozen bunches of 
artificial flowers, one set of false teeth, 
a gentleman’s wig, three sovereigns, 
a powder puff, two lace handker- 
chiefs, and a petticoat. 

3.34. Arrival of the Manager. 

3.34J. Departure of the Manager. 


5 ^ 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


4. Display by the comedians. 

4.15. Rival entertainment by the vocalists. 

4.20. ‘ Half-time ’ called. 

4.30. Exit the Band, under protests. 

4.35. Installation of amateur orchestra, bril- 
liant execution of the latest waltz. 

5. Grand march past and finale. 

'5.25. Eggs and bacon at the ‘Junior Turf 
Club.’ 

6. Bed. 

12’ a.m. Soda-water and dry toast. 

Ton jours a toi, 
“Frank Steward.” 

On the strength of this characteristic epistle, I 
dragged Massey away for a night from his studies at 
the University of Oxford, and chaperoned him to the 
festivity so graphically forecasted. 

Like Ceylon in the hymn, a theatrical dance is a 
place full of “ spicy breezes ” where “ every woman 
pleases, and only man is vile.” But the “ Alcazar ” 
show was “top-hole.” Mason had supervised the 
general arrangements to some purpose. Festoons of 
colored lights hung across the ceiling, the corridors 
were tropical with palms, an excellent buffet stood 
just off the ballroom piled with vintage wines and 
the best articles of diet in the catering line; the finest 
orchestra in the country sat on a raised dais, and, to 
crown the edifice of hospitality, feather fans were pro- 
vided for the ladies, and buttonholes for the gentle- 
men. Mason and his leading lady received the guests, 
who were the fine flower of dramatic and critical Bo- 
hemia, with a sprinkling of the jennesse doree of So- 
ciety and high finance. 


FEBRUARY 


53 


In the throng was every fair face that fills its row 
of stalls nightly, and brings grist to the mills of the 
illustrated weeklies. Amongst the crowd of men were 
Guy Ranford, who is building up success as a play- 
wright on his theory that love is a disease only to be 
cured by matrimony; Lord Matheson, a Scotch peer 
just of age, and an earnest student of the drama from 
the level of the stage-box; Julius Pryce, the noted 
critic who tickles his paper with a pen and it laughs 
with a harvest of epigrams ; and Stringer, who refines 
sugar, but hasn’t refined himself, and whose presence 
could only be explained on the ground that as he 
largely finances Mason he couldn’t have been left out 
in the cold. 

“My word, Hanbury, I’m your debtor for life,” 
whispered Massey to me, as we made a tour of inspec- 
tion, clinging to each other for moral support amidst 
the blaze of youth and beauty. I steered him care- 
fully away from the heroine of the latest stage ro- 
mance, who was displaying her married charms in a 
setting of electric blue, but I had difficulty in repeat- 
ing the maneuver when he encountered a spoiled dar- 
ling, wearing flame-colored chiflon under a net of 
lace, who could have mounted to any step in the peer- 
age she wanted, and whom rumor said was on the 
point of obtaining £10,000 damages from the heir to 
a Marquisate. Just when Massey, in his excitement, 
was about to dispense with a personal introduction in 
order to secure himself a partner for the next dance, 
I ran across Drummond, whom I had scarcely seen 
since Oxford days. Drummond had nearly broken 
his mother’s heart by throwing up his “ cramming ” 
for the Diplomatic Service, and joining a touring com- 
pany, in the two years of his association with which 


54j 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


a first-hand acquaintance with life and a capacity for 
sleeping upright formed the credit side of his account 
with destiny. Now he was filling a dude part in The 
Cock and the Hen at the “ Firefly/’ his not very am- 
bitious role consisting of saying Ha, ha ! ” in the 
first act, and doing a Gollywog dance in the last. 
Drummond lost no time in introducing my exuberant 
companion to a tall girl in a harmony of green and 
gold that stopped short at the ankles. Her impudent 
good looks promised to keep Massey out of mischief 
elsewhere. 

In the absence of Cynthia Cochrane, who was to 
arrive in time for supper, I contented myself with a 
“ dream ” in black, whose dancing had all the char- 
acteristics of a nightmare, including the falling sensa- 
tion that precludes the awakening, for she caught her 
foot in a passing flounce and dragged me headlong 
to the destruction of several yards of expensive fabric, 
and 

With ruin upon ruin, rout on rout, 

Confusion worse confounded,” 

in the case of other couples who were involved in my 
calamity. Extrication of the victims proved a task of 
some difficulty, but it was expedited by the kindly 
interest of the whole assemblage, which stopped its 
various occupations of the moment to assist in the 
work of rescue, chanting the while in uproarious 
chorus the well-known refrain — 

“ You’ll find about the hour of four 
A tangled mass upon the floor, 

And the sportsman underneath is Archie 1 ” 

By the time I had brushed the dust off my clothes, 
put on another collar in place of the one upon which 


FEBRUARY 


55 


a ton and a half of human beings had sat for what 
seemed to be half an hour, and generally made myself 
once more presentable, Cynthia had turned up, look- 
ing as fresh as paint and as pretty as a rose, although 
to my annoyance she insisted upon having a dance 
with Steward, whose determination to master every 
accomplishment in which he was deficient was only 
equaled by his inability to keep any sort of time what- 
ever, and his tendency to sudden attacks of giddiness, 
during which he had to be bodily upheld by his part- 
ner, or he would have sat down there and then. 

At one o’clock a general rush was made for supper, 
served in the big salon downstairs at three long 
tables. Steward had reserved places for Cynthia and 
myself alongside his, while opposite us was Massey, 
still loyal to Green and Gold,” and evidently finding 
no obstacle to reconciling his attachment to Dolly 
Thurston with a demonstration of affection toward 
the favorite of the moment. Cynthia and I sat for a 
moment spellbound by the crash of laughter and the 
roars of merriment which rose in a crescendo of sound 
to the distant roof. Few gayer sights could be im- 
agined than that presented by the great hall lit by 
every color of the rainbow, the jewels on the prettiest 
necks in the kingdom, in spite of all their glow and 
luster, flashing forth less brilliant lightnings than their 
owners’ eyes. 

The supper itself lacked no feature that might make 
it memorable. The band in the balcony with its 
popular melodies sung in chorus by the revelers be- 
low; the ‘‘Widow” dry and iced to a nicety; the 
quails with their culinary escort of truffles and cocks- 
combs; the crackers; and the paper hats, modeled in 
the fashions of all ages and nations, which were 


56 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


brought round with the dessert, set flowing currents 
of gayety and excitement that swept away the canons 
and conventions of the everyday world, till, at the 
striking up of La Mattchiche, a personage, in the 
helmet of a Roman legionary, leaped on to the table in 
a frenzy of Bacchic mirth, and, with one foot on an 
epergne of fruit, and the other in a finger bowl, did a 
pas-seul to the envy, and, subsequently, to the discom- 
fort, of his neighbors. As a climax Mason was en- 
throned in state on the center of the festive board, 
while his guests marched past him with knives, forks, 
and spoons held at the salute. 

Once back in the ballroom I found myself forming 
one of a large group around two young gentlemen 
who, each with his hands clasped under a walking 
stick passed across his elbows and below his knees, 
were engaged in the thrilling pastime known as “ cock- 
fighting.’^ The ‘‘ cake walk ” competition which fol- 
lowed was the usual sort of thing, half graceful, half 
grotesque. Massey introduced a new figure by walk- 
ing on his hands, his lady holding him by the legs, 
but the prize went to Drummond and his partner, the 
pair accomplishing a remarkable combination of skill 
and neatness. Drummond’s speech of thanks was 
short and to the point. 

‘‘Messieurs et mesdames, ladies and gentlemen, 
fellow-creatures,” he said, “ my companion is tongue- 
tied, I am breathless, you are all nearly speechless. 
Art is long, life is short, and my powers of oratory 
less. We thank you.” 

The Lancers were all that Steward had prophesied. 
I thought discretion the better part of valor, and sat 
out with Cynthia, with whom I should probably have 
stayed till we were swept out with the crumbs, had not 


FEBRUARY 


57 


a pink shoe hurtling past my head broken the thread of 
our conversation. I had the presence of mind to 
pocket it hastily as a trophy for my mantelpiece, and 
assume a look of anxious innocence which turned the 
band of searchers to disturb other couples. 

I’m afraid I can’t qualify as an efficient chaperon, 
for I failed on my departure to find any trace of 
Massey, save his hat, which by inadvertence he had 
left on a chandelier in the ballroom. 



• I * 



MARCH 


I'Ve behold woman at work incessantly. One man is a tish to 
her hook; another a moth to her light. By the various arts at 
her disposal she will have us, unless early in life we tear 
away the creature’s colored gauzes and penetrate to her 
absurdly simple mechanism. That done, we may, if zve 
please, dominate her .” — George Meredith, “Lord Ormont 
and his Aminta.” 






MARCH 


The OMces of the Evening Star^^ — Mr. and Mrs. 
Ponting-M allow at home — Massey excites Suspi- 
cion — and justifies it — The Correspondence of a 
Comedy Queen — Steward dines out 

E ver since I introduced George to Steward 
one night at ‘‘The Gourmet” in Lisle Street, 
Soho, where we had gone for a French dinner as a 
change from the unimaginative British menu at the 
Club, he has expressed a great admiration for the 
journalist, so that it was at his own request I took him 
round yesterday to the offices of the Evening Star to 
show him Steward in his element. 

I never set foot in Fleet Street without regretting 
I am no longer an inhabitant of that delectable land. 
The very atmosphere is electric with enticing whispers 
for youthful hope and spreading ambition. No Siren 
could play music half so entrancing to me as the roar 
of the printing presses and the bustle and stir in- 
cidental to the production of a newspaper. As we 
climbed the stairs to the sub-editors’ room, the walls 
shaking and the building reverberating to the stress 
and labor of the great machines in the basement, 
George merely remarked that he pitied the poor devils 
who had to pass their lives in such a confounded din. 
To me the uproar was eloquent with a thousand 
memories of the days when I sat before piles of copy 
— police court “ flimsies,” the latest divorce sensation, 
cuttings from the provincial Press, the unsolicited con- 


6 ^ 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


tributions of outside men, penny-a-liners ” anxious 
to increase their meager incomes by ungrammatical 
accounts of fires, street accidents, and the like. I saw 
myself once more with my coat off, my hair in the 
wild tangle that is the prerogative of the pressman, — 
by my side a cup of tea and a plate of what was once 
hot buttered toast, while the eight tape machines 
round the room clicked out eternally the news of Par- 
liament, the Law Courts, and Sport to my indifferent 
ears. With all the strain and worry, the ‘‘ bloomers 
that, in spite of one’s precautions, found their way 
into print, and the unforeseen descent of the editor 
in a whirlwind of vehemence and invective, to hurl 
over our devoted heads charges of incompetence and 
threats of dismissal, the life was worth living. One 
had one’s fingers on the pulse of the world. In my 
heart of hearts I knew that journalism is the only 
career that attracts me. There is no other profession 
in which I would more willingly win my spurs. 
True, the prizes are for the few, and the majority of 
journalists plod along on modest incomes all their days. 
But I ask no editor’s chair in which to sit in lonely 
splendor, approached by my subordinates only 
through the chill medium of the telephone, blue-pen- 
ciling in my Olympic wisdom their most cherished 
flights of fancy, and crushing their dearest schemes 
of circulating enterprise. Give me the rough and 
tumble of the fray, the tussle with the chief com- 
positor on the “stone” over the “make-up” of a 
page, the anxious consultation as to the story of the 
|day, and what to bill on the last edition ! I prefer the 
r sunshine and shadow of the world of men to any twi- 
iJight of the gods. 

‘After my accounts of the whirl of the journalistic 


MARCH 


63 


life, George was rather astonished at the halcyon 
calm of the sub-editors’ room of the Evening Star, a 
calm due to our arriving between two editions. The 
‘‘ Extra Special ” was going through the press, and 
the “Late” had not yet been embarked upon. So 
Steward had his head in a bowl of vegetarian mess 
that he had a partiality for, the chief reporter was 
smoking a pipe in a corner, and spotting the winners 
for the next day’s racing with the sporting editor, 
while the others, mostly new men since my time, 
with the exception of Woodward and Finch, were 
sprawling in various attitudes of relaxation and repose 
about the room. A knot of boys, employed to run 
errands, paste up the tape messages, and carry copy 
to the “ comps ” and proof readers, were scuffling on 
a long bench down the far wall, until shouted at by 
one of the staff, when they relapsed into a moment’s 
tranquillity before starting their commotion afresh. 
The warm air was redolent of the pungent odors per- 
meating the newspaper office, and quivering with the 
clatter of the linotypes, which came through a thin par- 
tition like the crackle of musketry. 

Steward, who gave a touch of local color to the 
scene by the two-days’ growth on his chin, received,! 
us heartily enough and did whatever was necessary in 
the way of introductions.* The visitors to the Evening 
Star sub-editorial room are so numerous and peculiar 
in the course of the day that nothing can surprise its 
inmates, and even the Sand-jak of Novi-Bazar would 
be greeted with yawns. Yet George’s immaculate 
“get-up” excited as much interest as was possible in 
the stolid nature of Finch, who, wearing a handker- 
chief in place of a collar, and with his shirt open at 
the neck, needed all the hints he could obtain from my 


64 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


spruce friend for his own sartorial guidance. I ex- 
changed greetings with Woodward, a methodical 
fellow of mediocre ability, but who never made a 
mistake at the ‘^desk,” and kept his billet on the 
Evening Star while more brilliant men came and 
went, inquired after mutual acquaintances on the Press 
Club, and asked him to show George how things 
were done on the smartest evening paper in Great 
Britain. 

“What’s on?” I asked of Steward, as Woodward 
complied with my request. 

“ Nothing of interest, my son. Hewson’s off on a 
story that may ‘ pan ’ out into a good murder, but 
people have grown so moral that we can’t raise a yarn 
worth more than three ‘ sticks.’ Now, if you’d start a 
Society scandal I’d play it up for all it was worth.” 

Steward broke off abruptly, as though a thought 
had struck him, seized a pencil, ran his fingers through 
his hair, and scribbled away for a minute. Then he 
read out the following: 

“BACHELOR’S PERFIDY 

^'Society's Favorite Leads Popular Actress to the 
Altar 

“ Where was Mr. Gerald Hanbury at twelve o’clock 
to-day? That is what the fashionable West End is 
asking, the ladies with sighs, the gentlemen with feel- 
ings of relief. 

“ He was being married. 

“ Who was he marrying — a Princess of the Blood 
Royal? a Countess in her own right, a Transatlantic 
heiress? He was leading to the altar Miss Cynthia 


MARCH 


65 


Cochrane, the charming ‘ soubrette ’ of the ‘ Firefly 
Theater/ 

‘‘ The ceremony took place in the Bodega. The 
bride, clad in clinging ‘ voile/ and a merino toque, was 
given away by her past. There was no best man, for, 
as Mr. Hanbury remarked to the officiating minister, 
‘ There can be no better man than myself.’ 

“ The happy couple have left for their honeymoon 
at Clapham Junction, on credit. 

‘‘No flowers, by request.” 

“ Hang you. Steward,” I said, as everybody roared, 
“ I didn’t come to be insulted.” 

Steward took a spoonful of his abominable diet, and 
called a boy. 

“ Here,” he exclaimed, “ get this set up and bring 
me a proof. Mr. Hanbury wants a memento of his 
visit.” 

I made a rush at the messenger, but he disappeared. 
I didn’t know office boys could move so quickly. 

I was thinking of the effective retort which, how- 
ever, escaped me, when a pile of copy thrust into the 
central basket drew general attention. George Burn 
was wandering around the room like a lost soul, 
Steward was frowning over the illegible handwriting 
of an important member of the staff, every one was 
absorbed. I took up a reporter’s notebook from the 
table, put down a paragraph, and, silently gesticulating 
to a boy, conveyed to him that I wished it put into 
type. The urchin grinned and went off. I leaned back 
nonchalantly and hummed a popular tune through 
my teeth. 

Ten minutes passed. George, who had finished his 
tour of inspection, whispered to me that he had to be 


66 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


at Rumpelmayer’s at 5.15. I made no response. A 
pile of proofs was brought in and divided out amongst 
those at the table. A minute later and a big fleshy 
man opposite burst into a roar of laughter. Finch 
followed suit. Steward looked up angrily. 

“ Can’t you fellows find something else to do than 
to laugh like hyenas?” 

“ He’s got even with you, Steward,” spluttered the 
fat man, still shaking with mirth. “ How’s this ? ” 

‘‘ The friends of Mr. Steward, the well-known 
journalist, will be pleased to hear that he changed his 
shirt to-day and put on another pair of cuffs. There 
is no truth in the rumor that he shaved. He did not. 
Appearances are often deceitful, but Mr. Steward has 
no appearance.” 

Steward swept the litter in front of him into one 
mass and hurled it at my head. I dodged for the 
door. 

‘‘ We don’t want your monkey tricks here, Han- 
bury,” he shouted after my retreating form. 

I forbore to reply; but when, on opening the 
‘^Last” edition of the Evening Star, I saw my offend- 
ing paragraph in the “ News of the Day ” column, 
evidently slipped in by some mischief-loving ‘‘sub,” 
I felt that I had got the best of the encounter. 

Mr. Ponting-Mallow is a bore. No self-respecting 
husband ought to be in his wife’s boudoir after three 
o’clock, and yet, when I called at Porchester Terrace 
at tea time, I found him there, with an Indian cheroot 
in full blast, reading aloud an article from the Eastern 
Quarterly on ‘‘Suttee and Symbolism.” Ponting- 


MARCH 


67 


Mallow has revived the extinct fashion of side whisk- 
ers, much to the disparagement of his personal appear- 
ance, his complexion is as parched as his favorite 
delicacy — Bombay duck — and he preserves a military 
precision in his dress, for his frock coat is always but- 
toned as tight as a tunic, and his trousers might have 
been worn at the Brighton Pavilion under the Regency 
without exciting comment. 

Ponting-Mallow merely raised his eyebrows by way 
of greeting to me, and continued his reading : 

‘‘ To the early European observers the practice of 
suttee — the immolation of bereaved wives on the 
funeral pyre of their departed lord and master — ap- 
peared as nothing else than the rite of an ignorant 
and degraded Paganism, a superstition of which the 
origin might be traced to those savage times when the 
death of their natural protector left the widows an 
easy and immediate prey to the enemies swarming out- 
side. Scientific vision, however, cleared from the 
mists of prejudice, sees in the ceremony of suttee a 
noble tribute to the sanctity of marriage in the East, 
by its insistence on the indissoluble nature of the 
union, and the inability of the wife to look upon her- 
self in any other light than that of the natural com- 
plement of her husband.” 

An involuntary exclamation of appreciation escaped 
from me. Mr. Mallow looked up. “A finely ex- 
pressed ” here he paused, with an irritating trick 

he has when half-way through a sentence, as if anxious 
to let the weight of his words sink into his hearer’s 
mind — ‘‘ er — truth.” 

‘‘ The practice seems well worth adopting here,” I 


68 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


suggested, “ with the addition of a pyre for widowers, 
so that they might also display a burning affection for 
the dear departed/’ 

In the Buddhist faith, Hanbury,” said my host, 
“ the devotion of the husband to his wife’s memory is 
presumed. He displays it best by — er — marrying 
again.” 

Most of us must be Buddhists then, without know- 
ing it,” I responded. ‘Ht’s very comforting to be 
able to have the sanction of religion to gratify one’s 
own personal inclinations. But weren’t the wives 
supposed to be capable of constancy? ” 

“ Easterns class women with animals in — er — pos- 
sessing no soul. The contact of Western civilization 
is gradually dispelling that idea.” 

‘‘Dispelling it? I should have thought it would 
have confirmed them in that belief. Give me charge 
of an Indian Johnny for a season, and I’d convince 
him of the unwisdom of modifying his original esti- 
mate of the sex.” 

“ Haven’t women treated you kindly ? ” asked Mrs. 
Mallow, with a pout that was meant expressly for 
my benefit. 

“They’ve led me a dog’s life,” I retorted. 

“ Ha, ha, ha ! ” croaked old Mallow in a fit of merri- 
ment, misplaced because a wise husband, conscious 
that the marriage of May and December can only be 
a success if the former may sometimes join hands with 
June, would have refrained from laughing at a young 
man who had come to reconcile a high-spirited and 
pretty woman to the incongruity of her position. 

I sympathized acutely with Mrs. Mallow’s predica- 
ment in being wedded to a man in whose life she had 
so little share that she ought never to have come into 


MARCH 


69 


it Mrs. Mallow and I exchanged a glance of disgust, 
a glance which Ponting-Mallow must have inter- 
cepted, for his mood underwent a swift transforma- 
tion. 

‘‘ Perhaps, Hanbury,” he said, as he picked up the 
magazine from his knee, “when you have — er — 
finished your witticisms you will — er — allow me to 
continue ! ’’ 

“ On the contrary,” exclaimed Mrs. Mallow, with a 
courage I admired, “ I think you’ve read quite enough, 
and it is very kind of Mr. Hanbury to come in and 
amuse us.” 

“ My dear Julia,” retorted Mr. Mallow, in his best 
courthouse manner, “ I must ask you not to — er — 
contradict me in my own establishment.” 

If the rift in the Ponting-Mallow lute widened any 
more, all other conversation would be engulfed in it, 
and my errand to Porchester Terrace remain unful- 
filled. But any frontal attack, with Ponting-Mallow 
as firmly entrenched in his chair as the Duke of Wel- 
lington in the lines of Torres Vedras, was doomed to 
failure. My eye fell on the parrot I had ostensibly 
come to prescribe for, and inspiration seized me. 

“Now, Polly, what do you think of it all?” 

As I asked the question the bird uttered a bubbling 
noise which might have been interpreted in any sense. 
I moved my left eyelid in an almost imperceptible wink 
at Mrs. Mallow, and continued: 

“ There, he says he’s awfully bored with us, and is 
simply longing to have you to himself ! ” 

The faintest suspicion of a smile dimpled my host- 
ess’s cheek, but her husband gave no sign that my 
words bore other than their surface meaning. I 
fidgeted, and upset a teacup, but that dense old Indian 


70 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


official, whose retirement from duty was obviously 
due to softening of the brain, made no movement of 
departure. He was only waiting for the door to close 
on me to inflict a further installment of ‘‘ Suttee and 
Symbolism ” upon his martyr of a wife. How I hated 
his chutney skin and his idiotic magazine ! 

In despair I once again apostrophized the parrot, 
who obligingly squawked in a piercing key. 

“Yes, he’s saying that, if he were a human being 
instead of a green bird, he would take you to a 
matinee at Daly’s.” 

Mrs. Mallow bent her head as I made the audacious 
proposal on the bird’s behalf, and I rose triumphantly. 

“ I really must be going,” I exclaimed, in anything 
but lugubrious tones, as I stood before the little lady, 
“ but I hope to see you again — at Daly’s,” I added 
under my breath. Then I flung a last word at Pont- 
ing-Mallow : 

“ Good-by, sir. I think if I were a Mahatma or 
Brahmin, or whatever the fellows are called, I should 
be more occupied in keeping my wife’s affections 
during my life than in procuring a theatrical and 
revolting exhibition of them after my death.” 

“ You’ll teach us — er — many things, no doubt, when 
you are married,” replied Ponting-Mallow, lighting 
another of his confounded cheroots. “ And learn a 
few, too,” he added as an afterthought. 

The sarcasm was wasted on me, for I had just 
caught Mrs. Mallow’s eye, and when I catch an eye 
like hers I don’t let it go easily. 

My considered judgment on Ponting-Mallow is this : 
He has all the characteristics of the louse without its 
pluck ! 

Clive Massey is beginning to be a source of anxiety 


MARCH 


71 


in many quarters. He is just the thoughtless, impul- 
sive soul whose welfare is a concern to everybody 
except himself. Anyhow, I see trouble ahead, and 
not upon unsubstantial evidence. The first hint came 
to me while I was leaning over the barrier at Princes^ 
Skating Club the other Sunday, intent on watching an 
elderly lady doing outside-edge backward, and pick- 
ing herself up after each turn. For patience and 
pertinacity she was beating the record set up by Bruce 
and the spider. She had fallen into double figures 
when a well-known voice sounded just behind me. I 
turned around sharply to be confronted by Miss Dolly 
Thurston and her aunt, whose house in Cadogan 
Square is a favorite pied-a-terre of the former’s when 
on the warpath in town. After the exchange of 
formal greetings. Miss Thurston dropped into con- 
fidential tones, meant for my ear alone. 

“ Have you heard anything of Clive Massey 
lately? ” she inquired, with a nonchalance that showed 
me how much importance she attached to my answer. 

Mother asked him to come to a dance, and got no 
reply.” 

‘‘ I’ve no more information than you have,” I truth- 
fully said. After all, there was no reason to connect 
the incident of the “Alcazar” ball with Massey’s 
shortcomings as a correspondent. 

“ He’s probably working hard,” I went on reassur- 
ingly. “ Hasn’t he got an exam on this term ? ” 

“ Mr. Hanbury,” and the emphasis in Dolly Thur- 
ston’s voice rebuked my suggestion, “you don’t look 
after your friends very well. Clive has scarcely been 
in Oxford at all. He finds London a pleasanter 
place.” 

“Isn’t it?” I asked, with engaging innocence. I 
wasn’t going to let tlie girl see I suspected anything. 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


n 


“ Mr. Hanbury, Clive’s getting into mischief. Sybil 
Bellew passed him in Piccadilly when he was walking 
with a stage person, and he wouldn’t look at Sy- 
bil.” 

A girl of Dolly’s age doesn’t concern herself with 
the moral welfare of an undergraduate except for the 
best of reasons — or the worst — it all depends on one’s 
point of view toward the institution of marriage. 
Massey must have made an impression at Southlands. 
I paid Miss Thurston the compliment of taking her 
seriously. 

“ I’ll find out everything there is to know. But 
young men will be young men.” 

“Can they only be young men with the help of 
young women?” asked Dolly Thurston, with an un- 
expected flash of wit, turning her head away a moment 
later, as she realized the boldness of her comment. 
Red-hot on the scent of an opportunity for the display 
of my diplomatic gifts, I forbore to reply, and rushed 
away with an abruptness that must have astonished 
my companion. I like to be in the front line of battle 
on all occasions. 

In the next few days, from various sources, I 
gleaned the following facts bearing on “L’ Affaire 
Massey ” : 

1. Massey had been seen lunching with a vision in 

brick-red, and a hat festooned with cherries — 
“a ballet girl with a bally orchard on her 
head,” as my informant phrased it. 

2. The ’Varsity Notes in a certain flippant weekly 

contained the following cryptic sentence : 
“A popular member of the cast of the forth- 
coming O. U. D. S. performance of The Merry 


MARCH 


7S 


Wives of Windsor is doing most of his re- 
hearsing in town, though opinion is divided 
as to whether he is rehearsing for a breach of 
promise case or a Registrar’s Office.” 

3. A mutual friend of George Burn and Massey- 

had accompanied the latter to buy a necklace 
of uncut turquoises, which rumor said might 
be seen nightly on the stage of the “ Firefly ” 
Theater during one of the most popular num- 
bers in The Cock and the Hen. 

4. The hall porter at the Club had been heard to 

declare to one of his satellites that Mr. Mas- 
sey’s young woman must be very fond of him, 
to write so many letters, and send them all 
round by special messenger with instructions 
to await reply. 

In this emergency I decided to look up Drummond, 
a thing easier said than done, however. If I called 
round at his rooms he was invariably out, if I sent up 
for him at the “ Firefly ” he was either ‘‘ on in front ” 
or absent with a cold, and his club in Leicester Square 
seemed to serve no other purpose for him than to act 
as a place where he might call for his letters. But I 
finally ran him to earth there one afternoon about four, 
to find he had just finished what he called ‘‘a light 
lunch after a wet night.” Judging from the array of 
empty oyster shells, the skeleton of what looked like a 
shark, but turned out to be a sole, the two grilled 
bones that might have belonged to the mammoth they 
dug up in Siberia the other day, and the bottle of 
**pop” turned upside down to prove its emptiness, 
any lightness Drummond had derived from the meal 
could only have gone to his head. 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


From the glimpse I had caught of Drummond at 
the ‘‘ Alcazar ” ball, I was under the impression he 
had scarcely changed at all from his Oxford days, but 
in the cold light of the day that filtered through the 
diamond-paned windows I saw that Drummond’s com- 
plexion was pasty, from the nightly make-up” of 
paint and powder, that his hair was thinner on the top 
than would have been the case had he led a more 
normal existence, and that he wore a scarlet knitted 
waistcoat picked out with green spots, a watchchain 
of plaited hair ending in a bunch of seals, and a pair 
of patent leather boots with white kid uppers.” 

The conversation, from my point of view, took a 
little time to get under weigh, because Drummond 
overflowed with embarrassing cordiality, and I was 
introduced forthwith to the other occupants of the 
half dining, half smoking room, that formed the chief 
part of the club premises, and plied with questions as 
to my opinion of this piece and that in which the pres- 
ent company were individually appearing, for the feed- 
ing of whose vanity I scattered fulsome eulogies of 
plays I hadn’t seen and didn’t want to. When I got 
Drummond to myself I asked him for particulars of 
the girl he had introduced Massey to at the ball. 

Alice Howard, you mean,” said Drummond, 
she’s in our show. She’s got a nineteen-inch waist, 
and takes ‘threes’ in shoes.” 

“ I don’t want her measurements. What’s she like 
to talk to?” 

“Saucy, very saucy.” Drummond’s voice had a 
reminiscent note. “Long eyelashes, and a short 
memory, narrow face and broad humor. She talks 
about ‘ her dear mother in the country,’ and you think 
of your dear father in the city. She ‘ simply loves 


MARCH 


75 


animals/ and only rides in motoi^. Slie says she’s 
devoted to her art, yet she’s quite artless. She ‘ knows 
all the ropes/ and has one of pearls. Oh, Lordie, 
she’s a handful!” 

‘‘ After that, I - should know her anywhere,” I ex- 
claimed approvingly. Whom has she got in tow at 
present ? ” 

‘‘ Don’t ask me,” was Drummond’s weary rejoinder. 
“ I can’t keep pace with all the highfliers in our show. 
There’s always some new boy being trotted out for 
my benefit when I stand ‘ right center ’ before the old 
rag falls on the tableau of the market place. If it 
isn’t a photo of ‘ darling Bobbie ’ at the wheel of a 
Panhard, grinning like an ape at the ten-guinea hat 
in the foreground he hasn’t paid for yet, it’s sure to 
be ‘ a duck of a bracelet ’ from some other silly 
juggins, upon the costliness of which I’m expected to 
make appropriate comment. I rather fancy Alice has 
a fresh ‘flame.’ At least I dimly recollect being 
shown a bangle, or necklace, or something. But I’m 
fed up with all their goings-on. When it comes to 
the Maiden Selling Plate I’m one of the ‘also-rans.’ ” 

At the conclusion of this brilliant impromptu Drum- 
mond flicked a speck of dust off one polished boot, 
drew the knees of his trousers carefully up to avoid 
bagging, undid the last two buttons of his waistcoat, 
and shut his eyes. As I reached the door he began to 
snore. He had earned his nap. 

The sequel was that Haines and myself got stalls 
at the “ Firefly,” and went to judge the case upon its 
merits — or rather, hers. We both spotted the young 
woman as soon as she came on for the song and 
dance, “ The Boy was Black, and so the Girl looked 
Blue,” which has helped to give The Cock and the 


76 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Hen a thirteen months’ run. Alice Howard, wearing 
a short costume of black and white lozenges, her 
unbraided hair tied with pink ribbon, looked the very 
picture of designing innocence. The necklace was 
there, reinforced by other jewelry in the shape of a 
locket on a long gold chain, four bracelets, and a mass 
of rings. She moved as though it was an awful bore 
having to come on at all, and went through the inane 
gyrations expected of the chorus with complete in- 
difference. We both agreed that she was a highly 
dangerous combination of attractions. Massey, in my 
rooms, had talked about life. The term life ” in 
the mouth of inexperienced people like himself is in- 
variably a euphemism for “ Woman,” and to a super- 
ficial observer Miss Howard offered plenty of unde- 
veloped territory for the explorer. It was this sense 
of the unknown in her acquaintance that would ap- 
peal to the venturesome in Massey’s character. 

Of course Drummond caught sight of me a few 
minutes later, but our attention was diverted from his 
pantomimic gestures of welcome by the interest Miss 
Howard displayed in the occupant of the stage box on 
the right, but whose identity was concealed from 
Haines and myself by our position in the stalls, until 
in the “ foyer ” during the interval we discovered Mas- 
sey. The latter seemed somewhat abashed at the en- 
counter. 

‘‘ Hello, here alone ? ” I exclaimed cheerily. 

The other man fell through at the last moment,” 
said Massey, with a hypocritical smirk. 

‘‘ Where are you sitting? ” I continued. “ I haven’t 
seen any signs of you.” 

I’m in a box.” 

Haines intervened. didn’t know you were a 


MARCH 


77 


millionaire, but if you’re the fellow that Flossie of 
the Ringlets has been staring at all the time, you’ve 
made a conquest!” 

Massey modestly disclaimed any responsibility, and 
began a movement of retreat. 

“You’ll come on to supper with us?” The ques- 
tion was mine. 

“Awfully sorry, old fellow, but I’m engaged.” 

“ We shall probably see you at ‘ the Roman’s ’ 
then,” I said, drawing my bow at a venture. Massey 
gave a start of surprise and annoyance. Evidently 
his rendezvous with Alice Howard had been antici- 
pated. He would have to make other arrangements. 
The plot thickened. 

“ I’ve got to write a note,” he broke out. “ See you 
fellows another time,” and he rushed off. 

Haines and I looked at one another. “Why on 
earth are we bothering about the fellow?” I asked. 
“ It’s no business of ours.” 

“ I rather like his young woman,” Haines retorted 
candidly, “and you enjoy playing the heavy father, 
Hanbury. That’s why we’re going to see this thing 
through.” 

So we returned to our seats when the bell rang, to 
resume our Vigilance Committee work in the interests 
of — Massey, I suppose. Haines fixed his opera glass 
on Miss Howard so persistently that Drummond, in a 
convenient interlude in the cafe scene, pointed out to 
her the interest she was arousing, only to be rewarded 
for his pains by the haughty toss of a fair head, an 
indifference on the lady’s part which did not last, for 
she took a careful survey of Haines a moment later, 
and cast a glance in his direction whenever she made 
an entrance. Haines’ dress clothes are a model of 


78 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


tailoring, and he believes in a carnation as a button- 
hole, so he deserved scrutiny. I could fancy Alice 
Howard spoiling the jealous Massey’s supper with 
talk of a rival admirer. I certainly gave her no credit 
for caring a rap about our young friend, or, indeed, 
about anybody, for a heart would merely have got in 
the way of her professional career. 

Haines wanted to draw the various supper haunts 
for the pair, but I put a stop to his malicious project. 
Massey deserved a run for his money, and I was 
grateful to him for giving our set conversational open- 
ings that would last at least a month. 

Confined to my Jermyn Street rooms by a heavy 
cold, and as bad a spell of raw weather as March can 
show, a fit of tidying up seized me yesterday, but I 
never got beyond the drawer into which Cynthia 
Cochrane’s correspondence had been thrust, for open- 
ing one envelope to see whether or not it was worth 
keeping, I became so interested that I went on from> 
sheet to sheet, and letter to letter, until the afternoon 
had gone, and the zeal for destruction evaporated. 

Extending over the nine years during which Cynthia 
and I have maintained friendship, the letters chronicle 
a record of sunshine and storm, and, if fate should 
ever intervene to sever my relations with the actress, 
they will serve to keep for me a golden memory. I 
little thought when, as a happy undergraduate, I 
chased a flying hat down an esplanade it would lead 
to a sentimental impasse with a woman destined for 
high honors in a profession in which success is al- 
ways hardly won. For if Cynthia’s letters show me 
one thing it is that the stage is conquered by some- 
thing more than the possession of two rows of white 


MARCH 


79 


teeth and an Odol smile. When a drawing-room 
darling, sitting on a Louis Seize chair, in a lace frock 
trimmed with baby ribbon, talks about “ going on the 
stage,” she pictures herself walking on in the limelight 
to the soft strains of the orchestra, clad in the latest 
creation of Reville and Rossiter, with all her friends 
in the stalls applauding till their gloves split, and the 
rest of the company spellbound at her loveliness and 
grace. Then the actor-manager will lead her three 
times before the curtain for a further salvo from the 
audience, when she will be free to drive away in an 
electric brougham, upholstered in white satin, to sup 
with the Duke of Magenta Stretlitz, who will offer her 
the strawberry leaves directly the ponlet an diable has 
been served on gold plate. As every girl I know 
cherishes this modest ambition, I often have occasion 
to recall the realities of theatrical life as depicted by 
Cynthia’s pen. 

The earliest epistles dealt with Cynthia’s experi- 
ences on tour, the following being sent one September 
from a holiday resort just big enough to boast a pier 
pavilion, and to hold a troupe of White Coons as well 
as the Golden Belle company: 

“ I’ve risen to 30/- a week on the salary list, and 
I’m going strong. Thanks to the billstickers, and the 
enterprise of the advance agent, the house has been 
full every night, and the manager as cheerful as a 
cherub, such a contrast from our last stopping place, 
where he swore the whole time, and sacked a girl be- 
cause she kissed the stage carpenter during the setting 
of the baronial hall. 

“ My chance seems a long time in coming, but as 
fortune, they say, knocks at every one’s door once in 


80 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


a lifetime, he is bound to rattle on my bit of oak 
sooner or later, and I shan’t keep him waiting longer 
than it takes to jump into the hall and raise the latch. 
I know I could do better than Grace Western, who is 
only playing the lead because her boy is rich, and 
backing her. She’ll exhaust even the boss’s patience, 
though, if she continues to carry on with a fresh fel- 
low in every town and to fill the local papers with 
paragraphs about ‘What the Little Bird Saw.’ If 
the little bird saw half of Grace’s goings-on he’d molt 
all his feathers, and take to blinkers. 

“We are having the best of times, picnics, tea 
parties, and gayeties without end. Indeed, without 
such intervals of calm as we get at places like this, no 
one could stand the racket and rush of touring. Why, 
I haven’t slept so well for months!” 

Then there is another in a different key, when 
Cynthia was in a northern manufacturing town dur- 
ing a bleak February. 

“ I’ve never been in a more horrible place. It rains 
all day, and I sit wondering what sins I’ve committed 
to deserve such punishment. The ‘ digs ’ are no 
better — a frowzy landlady, who is rarely sober, the 
mirror patched with brown paper, candle grease every- 
where, and the food brought up on dishes that look 
as though they hadn’t been washed since the last 
tenant went. When I complained, the woman said 
that actresses couldn’t pick and choose their lodgings, 
but must be thankful to find the people who would 
take them in at all. That’s the sort of thing that 
makes me want to chuck the stage for good and all. 

“ Things aren’t going smoothly in the show either. 


MARCH 


81 


The box office grumbles at the takings, everybody 
feels ‘ down in the mouth,’ and the manager thinks 
Tm * stuck up ’ because I won’t let him make love to 
me. Still, it will be all the same a hundred years 
hence ! 

“We are due in the suburbs in five weeks, hurrah ! 
Then, my dear, you shall give me supper, and we’ll 
do a ‘ Covent Garden ’ together and Til forget that 
men can be cads, and women wanton.” 

Ambition to succeed kept Cynthia loyal to the pro- 
fession, she had pluck and faith in herself, and she 
pulled through where a girl with less talent or deter- 
mination would have retired into private life, and a 
hat shop. From my privileged position behind the 
scenes I saw how hard was the fight. 

“IVe rehearsed from 9 till 3” (so ran one letter), 
“put in an evening performance from 7.30-10.30, 
saved a pal from making a fool of herself with a man 
who ought to have known better, and now Fm writing 
to you in order to let myself talk to somebody who 
does believe in me. When I become a ‘ star ’ won’t I 
be good to my understudy, my word ! — and to all the 
girls who are trying to live on less than £2 a week, 
and sending home a postal order to their mothers as 
well! I respect success more than ever now I realize 
how hardly it is won, and how for one victor there 
are ten vanquished.” 

Cynthia got her foot on the ladder, which was to 
reach to the stage of the “Alcazar,” by an incident 
described as follows by my lively correspondent: 

“ Grace Western has done for herself at last. Three 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


82 

nights ago she came on ‘full of corn/ according to 
the expressive vocabulary of the scene shifters, and 
cheeked the management right and left. So, at the 
end. of a performance in v^hich the gallery pelted our 
leading lady with pronouns and paper pellets, Grace 
was officially informed that, as her home circle must 
he pining for the return of its brightest ornament, 
she had better catch the night express. And now 
rumor runs that her Croesus isn’t taking any more of 
Grace because she smacked his face on the arrival 
platform of St. Pancras for not having already horse- 
whipped the London impresario of the Golden Belle 
on .her behalf. 

“I am playing second lead on the strength of the 
vacancy ; and what follows ? ” 

From that moment Cynthia Cochrane never looked 
back. She went from second to lead, from the prov- 
inces to London pantomime, and thence to the 
“ Alcazar,” and the glory of capital letters on the play- 
bills. 

It was with the pantomime engagement at the Pad- 
dington “Grand,” now nearly two years ago, that 
Jimmy Berners appeared on the scene. Cynthia, of 
course, has had hosts of admirers besides “ yours 
truly,” but to their advances and attentions she has 
presented an innocence and resoluteness baffling the 
most persistent and infatuated. In many ways Cyn- 
thia, from the point of view of the stage, is peculiar. 
She has always refused to acknowledge that the sign- 
ing of a contract gives her agent any right to sup 
with her, and, if her attention has been drawn to the 
fact that the same stall has been occupied night after 
night by the same individual gazing at her with 


MARCH 


83 


vacuous admiration, Cynthia has attributed the 
phenomenon to the drawing powers of the piece itself. 
But Jimmy Berners stood in a category by himself. 

Jimmy Berners was a city solicitor, with a very 
large practice built up on his shrewdness, and a 
capital which he continually increased by his capacity 
for successful speculation. Excluded from the social 
circles, he would fain have moved in through his 
strongly marked Hebraic features, and the racial 
habits he failed to divest hirtiself of, Berners betook 
himself to a free-and-easy sphere where a gentleman 
is permitted to wear a red silk handkerchief tucked 
into his evening dress waistcoat and present any lady 
with an article of jewelry at short notice. Proceed- 
ing behind the scenes at the Paddington “ Grand ” on 
one occasion, he had met Miss Cochrane, and, struck 
by her superiority to her surroundings, at once re- 
solved to better the acquaintance. Cynthia had drawn 
me a portrait of him at the time. 

Such a quaint creature came to see Cissie the other 
night (‘my latest mash,’ she introduced him as), a 
regular Aaron, with a buttonhole as big as a cauli- 
flower and a nose to match, his coat pinched in at the 
waist as though his five feet of height had been six, an 
amber-topped cane in his hand to make him look a 
‘ Percy,’ and a bouquet for Cissie that must have cost 
pounds and pounds. He stared so much at me that 
she got quite angry and called me a ‘poaching cat.’ 
Fancy me taking anything away from Cissie — even 
her reputation ! ” 

It wasn’t a case of Cynthia taking Jimmy Berners 
away from any one, but of Jimmy Berners throwing 


84 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


himself at Cynthia’s head. He put a car at her dis- 
posal, and when she removed to the ‘‘Alcazar” in 
the spring he followed, and leased a box, which was 
the nearest point he could get to her. The competi- 
tion at the “ Alcazar ” proved rather severe for 
Jimmy. Weighed in the managerial balance, he had 
been found wanting, and the stage door closed to him, 
until he had followed a private tip and invested a 
couple of thousand pounds in the shares of the theater. 

Cynthia’s attitude toward her persistent admirer 
was one of pity. 

“He’s so unfitted” (she wrote to me once), “for 
the role he’s taken up of breaking the hearts of ac- 
tresses. Those of us who do possess that unfashion- 
able commodity will not barter it away to a Frog 
Prince. Still, Jimmy is a good sort, however ridic- 
ulous he may be.” 

In his own eyes, Jimmy Berners was not in the 
least bit ridiculous. He was in deadly earnest, and at 
last forced Cynthia to acknowledge as much, by offer- 
ing her his hand — (“ Such a hand,” as Cynthia said, 
“all rings and fat!”). A refusal couched in such 
terms as might least hurt his feelings had been to no 
purpose, for the unabashed Berners still remained in 
attendance and his car nightly stopped the way at 
11.30 outside the “Alcazar” stage door. 

Although I should be driven off with contumely 
amidst a shower of scent bottles, powder puffs, 
slippers and lingerie, were I to say so in the dressing- 
rooms of the “ Alcazar,” I would advise a lady of the 
chorus to marry Jimmy Berners before Lord Fitz- 
noodle. In spite of his sallow skin, Jimmy is a 


MARCH 


85 


white man/’ and if his blood isn’t blue there’s plenty 
of it. But I should feel some hesitation in urging my 
point of view upon Cynthia herself. It would look 
remarkably as though I were using Jimmy as a cat’s- 
paw to draw my chestnuts out of the fire. I would 
willingly pay the price of a massive silver candelabra, 
or a set of hand-painted doilies, to see Cynthia 
happily settled in life with a husband she could respect, 
even if she couldn’t love him. Besides, the number 
of wives I know whose hearts had been given else- 
where when they married another, and now are so 
fond of their second best choices that they won’t even 
let them out of their sight to attend the funeral of an 
old friend on New Year’s Eve, or escort the governess 
to church, shows that there should be every hope for 
Cynthia. Marriage is like dipping into a lucky-bag 
— the smaller the hand the woman has, the less chance 
is there of her drawing out the stuffed monkey, or the 
doll which squeaks. 

All my friends say that I spend my days in the 
hopeless task of trying to combine the two opposite 
worlds of Society and Bohemia; and they warn me 
against incurring social pains and penalties for 
attempting to reconcile such extremes of existence. 
They would, in effect, imprison me within the narrow 
confines of a particular rank in life, on the assump- 
tion, I suppose, that any one adventurous enough to 
stray beyond the pale of the environment into which 
he was born, to encounter other humanities and 
creeds, will return from his pilgrimage across that 
borderland in revolt against the code ruling his former 
state, and import alien ideas shocking to the tastes 
and habits current there. But eccentricity is not 


80 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


originality, just as to be unconventional does not 
necessarily involve an appearance in the divorce 
court. I have no patience with the man or woman 
who willfully offend the susceptibilities of friends in 
order to proclaim their freedom from prejudice, and 
assert independence. It may seem a strange thing to 
say, but if I were a married man anxious to prove my 
belief that the wedding service was the fetich of a 
decadent civilization, I wouldn’t take Number Two ” 
to supper at the Savoy. In the same way were I more 
in sympathy with the politics of the New Cut than of 
Mayfair, I would prefer not to wave the Red Flag at 
a Park Lane dinner table. When I’m in Rome I do 
as the Romans do, even though the toga doesn’t suit 
my figure, and makes walking difficult. II fant 
soiiifrir pour etre helle/' and to have a good time. 
All the same there is no triumph so great as the attain- 
ment of the apparently impossible, the founding of a 
salon, say, on the ruins of the old regime. Any 
hostess can get dukes to meet dukes; the problem is 
to introduce dukes to dustmen. 

All of which is a mere literary prelude to the an- 
nouncement that Steward dined with me the other 
night to meet the Bellews. I had seen the Southlands’ 
motor standing in Bond Street, and remembering the 
social obligations under which she had laid me, I 

waited till Mrs. B came out of her jeweler’s, and 

invited her and a daughter for the following evening. 
Mrs. Bellew has always prided herself on keeping an 
open mind, which, in practice, takes the form of com- 
bining the position of Dame President of the local 
Primrose League Habitation with the Chairmanship 
of a Browning Society in Pont Street, and of letting 
her girls read anything they like. 


MARCH 


87 


Philosophers and wise men through the ages have 
endeavored to locate the seat of the soul in the human 
body, but without success. I know exactly where it 
lies, so I ordered the following menu, I flatter myself 
that the author of The Gourmet's Guide to Europe 
couldn't beat it. 

Bisque d’Bcrevisses. 

Sole aux Crevettes. 

Perdreau Casserole. 

Salade. 

Glaces Orange. 

Friandises. 

Mrs. Bellew was obviously disconcerted by 
Steward's turn-down collars, and ‘‘ made-up " white 
tie, but his tactful manner, and appropriate choice of 
an introductory topic dispelled her doubts, till the 
aroma of the crayfish soup put her quite at her ease. 
The fact that he was the librettist of the “Alcazar” 
musical play gave my old Fleet Street colleague a 
glamour in the eyes of Sybil Bellew, and made her 
ply him with erudite questions on the ways of the 
stage, in the framing of which she showed an alarm- 
ing knowledge of the contemporary French drama, 
and the latest cause celebre. As a type of precocious 
maidenhood she was new to Steward, and I could see 
that he was making a study of her, while he displayed 
an unwonted deferential manner, addressing her as 
“ my dear young lady.” Her mother was a couple of 
courses in getting her bearings right. Mrs. Bellew 
only enters on conversational duels as a principal, 
never a second, however unequal her powers be to 
sustain the position. She feels she owes it as a duty 
to her sex and class never to acknowledge intellectual 
inferiority, either in monologue or repartee. Per- 
sonally, I gibber at her. She mistakes nonsense for 


88 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


cleverness, just as with some people a catch phrase like 
“ I don’t think ” passes for humor. 

Steward early won Mrs. Bellew’s respect by defin- 
ing a Conservative as ‘‘ a Liberal with a public-school 
education,” and held her attentive to his speculation 
as to the most appetizing culinary description in litera- 
ture, which he decided in favor of the hermit’s venison 
pasty in Ivanhoe. We progressed through a variety 
of topics, comprising the rival merits of Nikisch and 
Mottl as conductors, the best wine to drink with fish, 
when ‘‘ rose du Barry ” would come in again as the 
fashionable color, the place of the nude in art (during 
which discussion I tactfully engaged Sybil Bellew in a 
verbal sparring match), and the Negro Problem in the 
States. 

By the time the last-named subject was under dis- 
cussion Mrs. Bellew had thoroughly aroused Steward’s 
sense of mischief. He had talked his best to uncom- 
prehending ears, and to find the conversation con- 
tinually turned from the point at issue by fatuous 
feminine interjections. No one likes to have his sallies 
spoiled by another’s density, least of all Steward. 
Needless to say, Mrs. Bellew was enjoying herself 
hugely. She was meeting on equal terms, so she 
imagined, a stimulating wit and raconteur, and giving 
a Roland for his Oliver. She introduced the Negro 
Problem to our notice apropos of the bunches of mus- 
catel and black grapes that the waiter had placed before 
us, the kind of association of ideas to which she was 
liable. Steward had suggested that the solution would 
only come from the negro race itself, when Mrs. Bel- 
lew remarked, with an air of engaging originality, 
‘‘White is white, and black is black, you know.” 

“ But the whiteness of the white is not equal to the 


MARCH 


89 


blackness of the black,” Steward replied, with admir- 
able gravity. 

“ How do you make that out ? ” queried the lady in 
a puzzled voice. 

“ When I was a child,” he said, I had a negro 
* mammy ’ for a nurse.” 

“That does make a difference, of course.” Mrs. 
Bellew was trying to regain her hold over the con- 
versation. 

“ The black pigment in the skin of the negro,” con- 
tinued the unabashed journalist, “ is responsible not 
only for his racial characteristics, but also for the 
essential qualities differentiating him from the Euro- 
pean-bred American. The Greeks attributed definite 
action to the bile present in the human body, speaking 
of ‘black care’ and ‘black jealousy,’ physical and 
mental conditions which they thought arose directly 
from that secretion. Now, if scientists could only 
extract the coloring matter from the skin of the negro, 
there would be no such problem as we have been speak- 
ing of.” 

Mrs. Bellew’s face lighted up intelligently. Her 
expression had been very downcast a moment before. 

“In other words, if the negroes could be made 
white, there would be no longer any blacks to have 
a problem? ” 

“ You take my meaning exactly.” Steward didn’t 
turn a hair as he said it. 

I burst out into explosive laughter. Mrs. Bellew 
looked at me in astonishment. Like a drowning man 
I clutched at a straw — a cheese straw, and simulated a 
paroxysm of choking. 

Mrs. Bellew must have suspected the violence of my 
gurglings, for she rose with a heightened color. 


90 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


‘‘ Shall we go into the lounge?’’ she asked. ‘‘It’s 
getting rather hot in here.” 

We moved accordingly. Even then Steward was 
not to be restrained from explaining to Mrs. Bellew, 
who was prepared to believe anything that fell from 
his lips, that the first violin was a leader of the 
Camorra who had murdered a Neapolitan bishop, but 
had had his appeal against extradition allowed. He 
also pointed out an elderly gentleman across the hall 
as the most vitriolic and celebrated dramatic critic of 
the day. Then he described how the reporters of his 
paper sat transcribing their copy with pannikins of 
absinthe before them, and how the staff of the postal 
district in which the “ Alcazar ” was situated had had 
to be strengthened to deal with the extra work en- 
tailed by the proposals of marriage that poured in for 
the chorus of the Bird in the Bush. Steward, in short, 
tore the veil from Mrs. Bellew’s eyes, and showed her 
a London more wonderful than the Bagdad of the 
Caliph. 

“ It’s been the most enjoyable of evenings,” she ex- 
claimed, on parting. “ I didn’t know you had such 
entertaining friends as Mr. Steward.” 

“ I didn’t know it myself,” I replied, “ until to- 
night.” 

Steward was thoroughly pleased with the whole 
thing. “ East of Trafalgar Square,” he told me, 
“ one’s sense of perspective is apt to get distorted.” 

“ You mean,” I interrupted, “ your sense of humor 
is apt to get out of control west of it. It’s not your 
fault that I’m still on Mrs. Bellew’s visiting list.” 

But Steward wouldn’t see it in that light, and began 
to talk of missionary work amongst the aristocracy. 
I know one thing. I should precious soon organize a 
massacre of the converts. 


APRIL 


"‘For one woman who inspires us with worthy ideas there are 
a hundred who cause us to make fools of ourselves !' — 
Napoleon Bonaparte. 


II 


APRIL 


Mrs. Mallow checkmates — Cynthia Cochrane makes 
another Conquest — A Young Man's Fancy" 

I HAVE no intention of calling at Porchester Ter- 
race again, but I will say this for my short acquaint- 
ance with Mrs. Ponting-Mallow — it has taught me 
that a pretty woman is a law unto herself. If she likes 
to darken her eyebrows, powder her face thickly 
against the rigors of an English spring, and go about 
with individuals other than her husband announcing 
that she is determined at all costs ‘‘ to be in things,” 
who is to say her nay? No man, certainly; and for 
the opinion, good, bad or indifferent, of her own sex 
Julia Mallow doesn't care one straw. “Women are 
such cats,” the lady once remarked to me, but she used 
the phrase in forgetfulness of the fact that she herself 
concealed the sharpest of sharp claws, and was not 
slow to bare them against the reputation of a rival. 
Where I was to blame was not in making a fool of 
myself — a person who isn't guilty of that in his youth 
is laying up the dullest of dull old ages for himself — 
but in thinking that nobody would see me doing it. 

I had been under the impression that the invitation 
conveyed through the medium of the parrot when I 
had found myself in the boudoir at Porchester Terrace 
between Mr. Mallow and the deep sea had been an 
invitation to a matinee at Daly's, and a matinee only. 
Mrs. Ponting-Mallow, however, took it to include 
lunch before, tea afterward, and then a long hansom 
93 


94i 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


drive back across the Park, in spite of my obvious 
reluctance to go so far out of my way. 

“And when are you coming again to let a quiet 
little mouse thank you for taking it out to see life ? ” 
asked the lady, as I was bidding her good-by on the 
doorstep, with an arch and fantastic playfulness that I 
was quite unable to parry. 

I had had a full five hours of Mrs. Mallow’s artificial 
curls and conversation, been enlightened on the rami- 
fications of her various male friendships, entrusted 
with confidences on her social ambitions, her husband’s 
shortcomings, her season’s gowns, her old grievances, 
and her new cook, and I was in as urgent need of an 
armchair, a cigar, and a string of oaths, as a man 
with a bullet through the head is of surgical treatment. 
So, clutching the area rail, I murmured incoherently 
something about its being “no kindness at all, only a 
pleasure.” 

That little woman displayed the ruthless cruelty of 
Nana Sahib, and asked me to call the following after- 
noon. I replied that I was engaged. Would the day 
after that suit me? It wouldn’t. Then Sunday? I 
should be out of town. 

“ Are you tired of me already? ” pouted Mrs. Mal- 
low, speaking the true word in jest. 

“ How can you think of such a thing? ” I hastened 
to protest, with the hypocrisy demanded by politeness. 
“ I’ll come to tea to-morrow, if I may.” 

The tea wasn’t such an ordeal as I had anticipated. 
Mrs. Ponting-Mallow at home took on a quieter tone 
than when abroad and bent on impressing her neigh- 
bors in theater and restaurant. Being less intent on 
pleasing, she pleased the more. Also, she had the 
tact to efface herself, and allow me to talk, with the 


APRIL 


95 


added Hattery of seeming to seek my advice on the 
subject of Ponting-Mallow. 

I told my hostess that all husbands "were trying, 
since only the weaker specimens of my sex surrendered 
the right of the bachelor to express admiration of 
beauty wherever found. 

I hadn’t meant that remark as a compliment to Mrs. 
Mallow, but she took it as one. 

‘‘ If you were married you wouldn’t be having tea 
in my boudoir. Aren’t you pleased that you are still 
single ? ” she said, and smiled at me. 

Certainly it was a new sensation to meet a woman 
who gave one a lead over conversational fences as 
Mrs. Mallow did. But I wasn’t out to take risks that 
afternoon — or any afternoon where she was concerned. 
I began to be a little frightened of the lady. She put 
on the ingenue air as crudely as she did the powder on 
her nose. 

I don’t see what being married has to do with it,’^ 
I replied, with gross inconsistency, in my anxiety to 
disarm the compliment. Mayn’t a man and a woman 
have tea together?” 

Of course ; there’s no harm in it ! ” Mrs. Mallow 
gave me a look that belied her words. ‘‘ That is, if 
people are sensible.” 

I held my peace, — not that my feelings were very 
peaceful. Quite the reverse. 

‘‘Are you sensible, Mr. Hanbury?” The lady 
cleared the obstacle with one question. 

“ I wasn’t when I promised to come to tea, but I’m 
going to begin to be sensible now.” .With this I 
got up. 

“ Surely you’re not going yet ? ” Mrs. Mallow 
struck a note of annoyance that was out of place in a 


96 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


frivolous conversation. Ponting won’t be back from 
the club for hours.” 

“ I deeply regret having to leave you alone for so 
long,” I said, with mock gravity, “ but duty calls me 
away.” 

It did, — duty to Ponting, although that wouldn’t 
have worried me if duty to an absentee husband hadn’t 
also coincided with my duty to myself. 

Mrs. Ponting-Mallow actually stamped her foot. 

“ It’s too silly of you behaving like this. I thought 
we were going to be such friends.” 

So we are,” I replied, ‘‘ in this way.” And I shook 
her hand in token of departure. 

Oh, you know what I mean.” Mrs. Mallow tossed 
her fair head with the petulance of a spoiled child. 

I looked past the artificially darkened line of her 
brows straight into her eyes. 

‘‘Frankly, I do,” I said, “but we’ll play the game 
by my rules, or not at all.” 

Every man gets the luck he deserves. At the end 
of the street I met Ponting-Mallow. 

That was to have been the end of Madame Mallow, 
so far as I was concerned, since enough is as good as 
a feast, and I had no mind to take up the role of “ lap- 
dog ” assigned to me. It was sheer ill-fortune, there- 
fore, that not ten days later I should have found the 
lady at a subscription dance in Kensington, and that 
she should have nodded instant and cordial recognition 
from the arm of her partner of the moment. By all 
the canons of convention, and on the strength of such 
knowledge of the sex as is contained in the line, “ Hell 
knows no fury like a woman scorned,” I ought to have 
received the cut direct, and a contemptuous curl of the 
lip from Julia Mallow. 

“ Confound it all ! ” I muttered. 


APRIL 


m 

Haines, whose new-born enthusiasm for the “light 
fantastic ” had been responsible for my presence there 
that night, caught the exclamation. 

“ What's up ? ” he asked, interested. 

“ That ! " and I pointed out Mrs. Mallow as she 
swung past us. 

“The very pretty little woman in the creme de 
menthe costume, who gave you the glad eye ? " 

Was I after all in danger of throwing away the 
pearl of great price ? 

“ Is she very pretty? " I asked. 

“ Not so dusty ! " replied Haines, who is wont to 
sacrifice lucidity of expression in order to indulge his 
fondness for verbal eccentricities. 

“ The other day," I explained, “ I gave Mrs. Pont- 
ing-Mallow ‘ No ' for an answer when she wanted 
‘ Yes,' and if I retract there'll be the devil to pay. 
She's married." 

“The devil is a lenient creditor," retorted Haines, 
with a pungent wit. “We all have our little accounts 
with him." 

“ I can't afford a hundred per cent for the loan. 
Besides, I've got no security to offer." 

Haines turned an amused look on me. 

“ Security, Hanbury ? Surely you of all people don't 
want security? ‘Nothing venture, nothing have,' 
you know ! " 

“ If that's your opinion, Archie," I whispered hur- 
riedly, “ I'm going to introduce you, for here she 
comes." 

As Mrs. Mallow, en route for the cool corridor of 
the hotel, passed through the doorway against which 
Haines and myself stood, I waylaid her and effected 
^ my purpose. 

“ How strange to meet you here ! " remarked the 


98 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


lady, while Haines bent gallantly over her programme. 
The epithet jarred on me. Why not “ pleasant,” or 
even ‘‘charming”? Haines was quite right — ^Julia 
Mallow was pretty, and the vivid green of her dress 
suited her admirably. Was it still too late to be friends 
again — ^just friends? I compromised with my con- 
science, and booked a dance. Then, leaving Haines 
to his own resources, I went to smoke a cigarette and 
analyze my feelings. The process took some time. 

When I retraced my steps to the scene of action I 
did so with the conviction that Haines had accurately 
gauged the situation. I had been far too precipitate 
in reading a woman’s motives. Tied to a bear of a 
husband, Mrs. Mallow had only wished congenial com- 
panionship from me, and a spice of that chivalrous 
sympathy which a man should always be ready to 
extend to beauty in distress. I was prepared to offer 
the fullest reparation in my power. The refrain of 
“ Kiss again with tears ” kept running through my 
mind, as though in some way it was applicable to the 
situation. I couldn’t see the connection. Mrs. Mal- 
low might. I determined to ask her. 

I met Mrs. Ponting-Mallow and Haines descending 
the stairs, as the waltz — my waltz — struck up. They 
looked extremely pleased with themselves — too pleased. 

“You’ll come and call, won’t you?” Mrs. Mallow 
said, as I appeared. 

Haines overdid the enthusiasm in his reply. Before 
I could stay him he was lost in the crowd pressing 
into the ballroom. 

“Is there a convenient sofa upstairs?” I asked my 
partner. “ I suppose we’re not going to dance this ? ” 

Mrs. Mallow gave me a curious glance. “ Oh, yes, 
we are,” she replied. “ Every bar of it.” 


APRIL 


99 


I put all the appeal I was capable of into my voice. 
“Won’t you sit it out? Fve got so much to say to 
you — about the other afternoon.” I faltered in spite 
of myself. 

“I insist upon dancing. It will save you making 
conversation to me.” 

Before I could probe the inward meaning of her 
remark Julia Mallow had dragged me into the current, 
and for twelve minutes by the clock I twisted and 
turned round that infernal room, till my collar melted 
and my hair stood on end. Ever and again my partner 
would turn up her face to smile at me, till I knew that 
Tantalus had had a pretty rotten time of it in Hades. 

But even the agony of the dance was preferable to 
the tortures Mrs. Mallow inflicted on me during the 
interval which followed. Refusing to sit in any less 
conspicuous spot than the big hall of the hotel, the 
lady seemed possessed by a mocking spirit. I could 
neither make her become serious herself, nor take me 
seriously. So soon as ever I approached topics which 
promised well for an explanation on my part as to my 
previous attitude toward her, Mrs. Mallow steered 
the conversation on to the shallows, to wreck it com- 
pletely on such a subject as the rival merits of Dandy 
Dinmonts and bobtailed sheep dogs for keeping down 
rats. 

“ I can’t make you out at all,” I said, disgust at 
Mrs. Mallow’s conduct my prevailing sentiment, as I 
escorted her back at the summons of the band. “ Once 
I was under the impression that we got on rather well 
together.” 

“ We all form wrong judgments at times, Mr. Han- 
bury. Now I made a mistake about you.” 

“A mistake?” I repeated it feebly. 


100 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


“Yes!” Mrs. Mallow gave a malicious emphasis 
to the simple affirmative. “Your man-o’-the-world 
air deceived me. I didn't really mean to frighten you, 
though.” 

In a whirl of amazement I stopped dead. “ I fright- 
ened ? What at ? ” 

“ At a married woman. That makes all the differ- 
ence to you, doesn't it ? ” 

Mrs. Mallow slipped from my side. When I had 
recovered sufficiently from the stormy emotions she 
had aroused to look around me, it was to see her 
dancing with Haines. 

Scorned — and supplanted, I shook the dust of that 
ballroom from: my feet and left. 

When I next saw Haines he was eating crumpets in 
the club. I pounced on him in feverish curiosity and 
taxed him with contriving the mystery of Mrs. Mal- 
low's callousness. Haines received the assault with 
the surprise of an innocent person, but his first words 
convicted him. 

“ Thank me,” he said, “ for saving you from your 
worse self. You as good as told me that you wanted 
rescuing from the machinations of a woman, old fel- 
low, so I did the trick.” 

“ It was a trick,” I retorted, “ and a dirty one.” 

“ Come now, Hanbury, my friend, be just if you 
can't be generous.” And Haines carefully brushed 
the crumbs off his coat. “You were hovering on the 
brink of temptation, I only pushed you back into 
safety.” 

“ I don't want safety.” 

That was the truth ; I didn't. 

“I knew that, but you've got it now, in spite of 
yourself. I gained you a moral victory at the cost 


APRIL 


101 


of a defeat to your pride. I pictured you to the lady 
as a diffident Don Juan, a ‘ fain-would-I-rise-but-that- 
I-fear-to-fair sort of person, forever tiptoeing along 
the pleasant paths of dalliance, but never coming to 
grips with the realities of temptation.’’ 

‘‘ Anything more ? ” I put the question in rising 
indignation at the monstrous part Haines had played. 

‘‘ Lots ! ” Haines spoke cheerfully. “ I laid the 
paint on thick. I told Mrs. Mallow that your brag- 
gadocio air was only an affectation, a mask concealing 
a cherub’s face. Mrs. Mallow doesn’t want cherubs 
at any price, so you got the chuck.” 

“ And you told all this infernal pack of lies in order 
that you might take my place ? ” 

Haines raised a warning hand. ‘‘ Steady there, 
Hanbury, I wouldn’t advise my worst enemy to play 
number three at Porchester Terrace.” 

‘‘ Hello ! ” I exclaimed. ‘‘ How did your call go 
off?” 

It didn’t.” Haines’ words had the ring of sincerity 
about them. ‘‘ That husband of hers smoked like a 
chimney all the time, and read an article on the 
sources of the Brahmaputra when he wasn’t scrapping 
with his wife over the silliest of details. I was bored 
stiff. Not for all the smiles in the world would I go 
there again. You’re welcome to the billet so far as 
I’m concerned.” 

‘‘What about ‘nothing venture, nothing have,’ 
Archie?” After the way he had treated me I was 
justified in quoting Haines against himself to his own 
discomfiture. 

“ India has much to answer for when it sends men 
home with no livers.” The remark sounded irrele- 
vant, but I knew what Archie Haines meant. 


10 ^ 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


‘‘And when they have young wives as well/^ I 
added, “ the practice becomes a positive scandal.” 

Then we clinked teacups to the death and burial 
of Ponting-Mallow, C.S.I. The problem of dealing 
with his widow was left till the hypothesis material- 
ized. 

James Berners, solicitor, has a lot to learn if he 
thinks that, on the strength of an old friend like 
myself having presented Miss Cynthia Cochrane, of 
the “Alcazar,” with a pair of earrings, he is justified 
in sending a diamond “ dog-collar ” on his own be- 
half. An individual who is described to his face as 
“ silly old Gerald ” is on a very different footing from 
one to whom the formal title of “ Mr. Berners ” is 
accorded. Berners’ offering had been returned by the 
next post, but Cynthia had been ill-advised enough to 
dispatch it with a note suggesting that there must have 
been some mistake on the part of the shop, and ending 
with the Parthian shot of congratulations to Jimmy 
on his, doubtless, forthcoming marriage to the lady 
for whom the jewelry was really intended. 

“ Now you’ve let yourself in for a dose of Berners 
with a vengeance,” I told Cynthia, when she had fin- 
ished her account of the incident, on the morning after. 

Cynthia threw away her cigarette end and lit 
another. 

“ I couldn’t resist giving Jimmy a dig,” she said. 

“ That sound a dangerous game to play with a man 
who hasn’t an ounce of humor in him, or he wouldn’t 
be still hanging round the ‘Alcazar.’ If Berners 
could be laughed out of constancy, it would have been 
long ago. His persistency and obtuseness will remove 
far more rooted objections to his company than you 


APRii; 


lOS 


entertain. Mark my words, Cynthia,’^ and I shook a 
warning finger at the girl; “he’ll be round here 
precious soon to explain that your letter was written 
under a complete misapprehension, and that his 
present was for your slender neck. What’s more, 
if you aren’t careful, he’ll try to clasp it there him- 
self.” 

Cynthia’s adorable little face wreathed itself in 
smiles at the absurdity of my suggestion. Her merri- 
ment died away in a frown as the door-handle rattled, 
as only the door handle in flats can, and in walked 
Berners himself. 

James Berners was wrapped in a fur coat, the im- 
possible collar of which was formed of two seal skins, 
others giving each sleeve the appearance of muffs. 
On his head at an angle of forty-five degrees was set 
a Tyrolese hat, with a cloak-room ticket stuck in the 
band, while a shock of black, shiny curls created the 
impression that Nature at his birth had supplied him 
with lamb’s wool instead of hair. He carried an ivory- 
topped cane in his hand, a cauliflower — or was it a 
tomato? — in his buttonhole, and a cigar, in an amber 
holder, stuck out from the middle of his pale face, 
with its high cheekbones, and broad-based nose, like 
the horn of a rhinoceros. He had but to show himself 
out-of-doors to become another Joshua, and make 
every living thing in his immediate neighborhood stand 
still in amazement. 

In this emergency Cynthia Cochrane showed the 
stuff she was made of. She forestalled any remarks 
on the part of the apparition by rapidly conveying to 
Berners that he needn’t have troubled to come round 
so early to apologize for the jeweler’s stupidity, that 
she quite understood the annoyance he was feeling. 


104 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


that she wished him every happiness in his future life, 
that it was no use his taking off his coat because she 
was just going out herself to do some shopping, and 
that the weather was warm for the time of the year, 
but that one could never be too careful. It was 
masterly, and not a Chancellery in Europe but could 
have profited by the exhibition of diplomacy. 

Then, however, Cynthia marred the excellence of 
her performance by checking me in the act of insti- 
tuting a tactful retreat in order to introduce me to 
Berners. A friend of mine had consulted Jimmy 
Berners in a case of blackmail, and I had, on one occa- 
sion, inadvertently gone off with an umbrella of his 
from the “Alcazar’’ and failed to return it because 
the handle pleased me. But as these two facts even 
taken together hardly constituted acquaintanceship, 
I swallowed my scruples and submitted to the for- 
mality for Cynthia’s sake. I grasped a fat, flabby hand, 
fringed with onyx signet rings, and remarked that I 
had often heard of him from Cynthia — Miss Cochrane, 
as I corrected it to, lest Berners might copy me in this, 
as well as in earrings. 

While Cynthia had been speaking, Berners had 
never taken his gaze off her, and so manifestly was 
he under the spell of her presence that he barely gave 
me the courtesy of a glance lest he should lose a single 
gesture or expression of his adored one. Such 
dumb devotion was touching, but it had the disad- 
vantage of preventing the intruder from realizing that 
he was as unwelcome a visitor as his diamonds had 
been. 

“ You mustn’t let me waste any more of your time,” 
remarked Cynthia impatiently, after Berners had stood 
in the open door for a full five minutes, as motionless 


APRIL 


105 


as a wooden Highlander outside a tobacconist’s, and 
it became evident he had no intention of leaving the 
flat of his own initiative. I suppose you’ve got your 
car waiting below ? ” she asked. 

Some hidden spring in Berners’ memory was 
touched by this question, for he advanced into the 
room, put his hat on the table, and spoke for the first 
time. 

“ My dear Miss Cochrane,” he began, ‘‘ your send- 
ing back the little gift ” 

(I liked that, when at least two hundred of the 
‘‘best” had gone to its purchase!) 

“ — has given me the pleasure of coming round in 
person to explain.” 

Jimmy spoke with an exaggerated care and pre- 
cision, as though he was struggling to avoid falling 
into the vulgar colloquialisms more natural to him. 
His coarse, vigorous self, in its trappings of luxury 
and wealth, created the effect of a pebble set in gold. 
From Cynthia’s own account he was none the less 
likable, an excellent companion, shrewd and enter- 
taining. Only where she was concerned did his wits 
desert him, to give an impression of folly. And 
certainly he was doing a very foolish thing at that 
moment. 

“ There was no mistake, my dear Miss Cochrane,” 
Berners continued, in what was meant to be a honied 
voice, but which only succeeded in being Insinuating; 
“ there was no mistake ; ” and diving into his pocket 
he produced the identical box in which the ill-omened 
jewelry had arrived. 

Cynthia sounded a note which I had never heard 
from her before. 

“ If there was no mistake I should be very angry 


106 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


indeed, Mr. Berners, — so angry that you would never 
speak to me again.’’ 

Berners’ sallow countenance turned even paler, and 
took on a look of genuine alarm. His hand, clasping 
the box of jewelry, hovered nervously on the edge 
of his pocket, and then vanished into its capacious 
depths. His thoughtless attack on his loved one’s 
self-respect had been repulsed with heavy loss. With 
its defeat, and the distress so evident in the enemy’s 
demeanor, Cynthia’s kind heart relented. 

“I was sure, Mr. Berners, there must have been 
something wrong somewhere,” she said, holding out 
her hand. “I don’t allow anybody to insult me in 
that way. If you want to remain friends with me you 
must never give me anything — except the loan of your 
motor car sometimes.” 

Her strange visitor underwent a complete trans- 
formation. From the depths of despair he scaled the 
heights of joy, as, taking Cynthia’s outstretched fin- 
gers, he wrung them. 

‘‘ The car — that’s it,” Berners almost shouted. “ IFs 
waiting outside. Come along to lunch at Brighton. 
That’s really what I came round for.” 

The ready hypocrisy was forgiven for the sake of 
the good nature prompting the request. Cynthia 
clapped her hands with the enthusiasm of a child. 

“ Oh, Mr. Berners,” she cried, “ how simply delight- 
ful of you. And, of course, you mean Gerald Han- 
bury to come too. He will behave quite nicely, and 
try to be amusing.” 

Thus prompted, Berners extended his invitation to 
myself — not in a very pressing rrianner. That could 
hardly be expected. 

‘‘ I shan’t go without you, sir,” said Cynthia, turn- 


APRIL 


107 


mg to where I stood, reluctant to accept grudging 
hospitality, and not particularly attracted by the pros- 
pect of Berners at close quarters for the best part of 
a day. “ YouVe simply got to come. You wouldn’t 
be so selfish as to deprive me of a treat. Yes, of 
course, he’ll be overjoyed to accept, Mr. Berners. 
Thank you ever so much. Say ‘ Thank you,’ Gerald.” 

I said, “ Thank you.” 

Cynthia departed to the neighboring room, where 
to a running commentary of delighted exclamations 
she effected her toilet, and, as we judged by our sense 
of hearing, threw her wardrobe into a wild tangle in 
the search for necessary garments, finally reappearing 
in a sable coat and toque, with a white motor veil 
wrapped over her heai through which her eyes 
sparkled like two stars seen through the mists of 
night. 

The vision of Cynthia, and her radiant spirits, ban- 
ished every scruple as to the wisdom of my taking 
part in an expedition headed by Jimmy Berners. I 
forgot his vulgarity, and his overcoat, in the overflow- 
ing gayety of the prettiest girl in the world. To the 
echo of Cynthia’s laughter, and the music of her 
voice, I climbed into Berners’ car, and was whirled 
away to Brighton with Beauty and the Beast. 

Once free of London, Berners olfended me less. He 
couldn’t help his personal appearance, although a 
shrewd person, such as he was reputed to be, ought to 
have toned down its effect by a quiet mode of dress, 
rather than have heightened it by cramming on to his 
person as much of his wealth as he conveniently could. 
While Jimmy directed his conversation to his fair 
neighbor I was content to turn my attention to the 
scenery, looking its best on a perfect spring day, and 


108 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


hold Cynthia’s hand under the rug*, only speaking 
when she drew me into their idle chatter, or when an 
assumption by Berners of undue proprietorship over 
the girl led me to a vigorous assertion of my rights, 
and a forcible explanation to him of the inferior posi- 
tion he occupied in her estimation. But with this 
one exception the sixty miles was covered amicably 
enough, — Cynthia and Berners gossiping on the stage 
and its concerns, and retailing an endless succession 
of theatrical anecdotes that would have proved the ruin 
of the editor who printed them, and made the fortune 
of any counsel specializing in the law of libel. Still, 
I for one was glad when we reached the sea, and the 
car came to a standstill before the glass and iron- 
wrought portal of the Cosmopolitan Hotel. Cynthia, 
I have an idea, was of the same way of thinking, for 
she squeezed my hand, and whispered, ‘‘ So that’s 
over,” as we disposed of our wraps before proceeding 
to the sumptuous lunch which Berners had had the 
forethought to order by telegraph before leaving town, 
and to which, it is superfluous to add, we did the full- 
est justice. 

It must have been half-past two before the ices had 
followed the rest of the good things, and we were free 
to stroll into the great lounge for coffee and cigars. 
No sooner had we set foot in the wilderness of palms, 
marble-topped tables, red plush settees, and Persian 
rugs, crowded with a typical selection of those who 
think Brighton and the Cosmopolitan the only place 
in which to spend a week-end, than my heart sank to 
my boots, and would have gone even lower were such 
a feat possible. For there, inside the central cluster 
of tropical plants, from which she could command 
every one and every thing, was seated, beyond all 


APRIL 


109 


manner of doubt, the rotund and majestic form of 
Lady Fullard, her gaze riveted — and for this small 
mercy I was devoutly thankful — on the contents of 
the daily paper — ^the advertisement columns, probably, 
in search of a new domestic, since Lady F ^s un- 

controllable temper and sarcastic wit keep her fre- 
quently occupied in that direction. Sir John sat by 
her, and his health was responsible, no doubt, for the 
amazing phenomenon of his wife’s presence at the 
Cosmopolitan — of all places. They must have lunched 
upstairs privately, for there had been no sign of them 
in the restaurant. Why couldn’t the tiresome old man 
have looked after his ailments better, and spared a 
worthy young man acute mental torment? So I 
thought, as I looked around for a secluded table out 
of the Fullards’ range. A sense of what sort of tale 
Lady Fullard would tell of my association with a per- 
son of Berners’ stamp, who looked like a son of Shy- 
lock and the Queen of Sheba, dressed as a combina- 
tion of stage coster and a millionaire from the Far 
West, with his crimson waistcoat, check suit, and the 
precious stones he scattered over his tie and fingers, 
brought out all the coward in me. I made for a shel- 
tered corner in an alcove, Cynthia following obedi- 
ently enough. But Berners was up in arms at once. 
He had come to Brighton with Cynthia to be seen, 
and he wasn’t going to hide his light under any bushel. 
He protested, and loudly, that it was a bit thick to 
come all the way from town to see the swells, and then 
creep behind a whacking great palm.” 

Suspecting that there was a method in my madness, 
Cynthia Cochrane backed up my choice of a resting- 
place, but nothing would satisfy Jimmy Berners, whose 
obstinacy grew with every persuasive word addressed 


110 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


him, but that we should sit out in the open, where 
Lady Fullard would have seen me one moment, and 
invented a string of innuendos and hypotheses about 
my companions the next. But all chance of our carry- 
ing the day with Berners was lost when a group of 
persons in the distance, whom I instantly recognized 
as Mason, the proprietor of the ‘‘ Alcazar,’’ with some 
members of his company, caught sight of Cynthia 
Cochrane, and signified, by violent gestures, that she 
and her friends should join forces with their party. 
Cynthia could hardly refuse to sit with her own mana- 
ger, even for my sake. 

‘‘ Go along to Mason,” I whispered to her, ‘‘ and 
take him my love. I’m going into the hall to wait for 
you. There are some people I know sitting by, and I 
daren’t face the music with that,” and I pointed sur- 
reptitiously to Berners, who with his hands in the 
armholes of his waistcoat displaying a yard of the 
gold cable he used as a watchchain, was standing 
jealously by till my secret colloquy was ended. 

I reached the front hall by a circuitous and stealthy 
route, and began a comprehensive study of the time- 
tables, steamship guides, and excursion notices hang- 
ing on the walls, until I knew exactly the number of 
times one changed between Dunfermline and Killaloe, 
and the cost to a farthing of every circular tour in the 
United Kingdom. I was beginning to go over the 
west-coast watering places and their lists of attrac- 
tions, for the third time, when a sudden end was put 
to my researches. Lady Fullard swept out of the 
lounge. I tried to hide my head in a guide-book. 
Vain folly ! 

Is that you, Mr. Hanbury ? ” she asked, raising 
her glasses to survey me the better. 


APRIL 


111 


I would have denied the fact if I could, but I 
couldn’t. Lady Fullard knew I wasn’t a twin. 

‘‘ Are you staying here? ” Lady Fullard went on. 

‘‘Only for the day.” 

I saw she was about to ask another question. A 
courage born of despair rose in me. “By myself,” 
I added. “ My tonsils are a little weak and require 
sea air.” 

I gave a feeble cough to prove the truth of my as- 
sertion. Tonsils, I believe, were to be found in one’s 
throat. Or was it jonquils? The doubt con- 
fused me. 

“ My mother,” I said, “ wished to be remembered to 
you. I must go off and fetch her ; good-by.” 

“ But a moment ago you had come down here alone, 
Mr. Hanbury!” pursued Lady Fullard, with um 
feminine logic. 

“ When I said I was in Brighton alone,” I stam- 
mered, “ I meant I was with my mother.” 

“What do you mean, Mr. Hanbury?” 

The waiter, coming up to Lady Fullard, saved me 
from an answer, which, for the life of me, I was un- 
able to frame. I felt grateful to him. A second later 
I could have slain the idiot, as he held out a silver 
salver upon which lay a gold net purse containing a 
powder puff. It was Cynthia’s. 

“ This was found under your chair, madame,” the 
man explained. 

Lady Fullard glared menacingly at him. 

The fellow paused with a puzzled expression. 
“Weren’t you lunching with this gentleman?” and 
he turned inquiringly to me. What a question to ask ! 

“Gerald, where are you?” rang out in Cynthia’s 
clear tones. “ Hurrah, there’s my purse, I thought 


lU 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


you had it, Gerald. I beg your pardon,” and catching 
sight of Lady Fullard the girl stopped short. 

Cynthia Cochrane made a perfect picture, her cheeks 
flushed with health and happiness, her eyes flashing 
the most dangerous of glances, distinction and grace 
in every line and pose of her figure. Even Lady Ful- 
lard’s grim features relaxed. As for me, I didn’t care 
what happened. 

‘‘Lady Fullard,” I explained, “may I introduce 
Miss Cynthia Cochrane of the ‘ Alcazar,’ one of my 
oldest friends! Cynthia, this is Lady Fullard, who 
lectures me, disapproves of my goings-on, and thinks 
I’m an idle scapegrace! Tell her I’m not as bad as 
all that.” 

For a moment the two women faced each other in 
an embarrassed silence, then Lady Fullard took Cyn- 
thia’s hand in hers and patted it. 

“ I’m glad to have met you, my dear,” she said, 
almost tenderly. “ I thought what unusual ability you 
showed when I saw your performance the other night. 
I’m sure you’re as good as you’re pretty. Friendship 
with you won’t do Gerald Hanbury any harm.” 

Cynthia’s exuberant spirits had given place to a 
more subdued mood as the elder woman was speaking. 

“ Thank you for saying such good things,” she said 
softly. “ People aren’t always so sympathetic to those 
of us on the stage as you are. I’m very grateful to 
you, not only for my own sake, but for Gerald’s as 
well, dear Lady Fullard.” 

A wave of appreciation for Lady Fullard’s action 
overwhelmed me. 

“ I’ll never forget your saying that to Cynthia,” I 
muttered, my voice unaccountably gone ; “ you’re a 
brick!” 


APRIL 


113 


“I must go back to Sir John,” remarked Lady Ful- 
lard, with a touch of inconsequence that was the truest 
tact. ‘‘ He’ll think I’ve got lost,” and with a parting 
smile at Cynthia she moved away. 

When she had passed out of sight I turned to 
Cynthia, her gayety evaporated, her head downcast. 

“ My dearest Cynthia,” I said in the steadiest tone 
I could command, ‘‘you’ll never score a bigger 
triumph than you have just won.” 

And if she lives to be a hundred she never will. 

A successful son, I take it, falls in with his parents’ 
wishes, when they coincide with his own, and conceals 
any divergence- of opinion that may disclose itself be- 
tween the generations, by saying little though he may 
think the more. If so I am a failure. I went down 
to spend Easter at home, knowing very well that I 
was giving hostages by affording my father and mother 
the opportunity they had long awaited for personally 
pressing on me their views as to my future, matri- 
monial and professional, and which my talents as an 
elusive letter writer had hitherto postponed. But I 
stood sorely in need of a spell of quiet after my anxious 
time with Mrs. Ponting-Mallow, and the charm of the 
country in April called me with an insistence which I, 
hardened Cockney though I was, could not disregard. 
It is easy to be wise after the event, but, had I known 
what was in store for me by the domestic hearth, I 
would have shrunk to a shadow on the flagstones of 
London before accepting the treacherous hospitality 
of my parents. 

My father is an easy-going country gentleman, ready 
to let things slide if he can thereby escape an argu- 
ment — in political phraseology a “ peace at any price ” 


114 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


man. On his own initiative he would never have sent 
the ultimatum of January last, with its reflections on 
my bachelor state, since his cause of complaint against 
me is my taste for literature. My father’s outlook 
on life is that of the dweller on the soil. The growth 
of social forces seeking to break the spell cast by the 
land over its occupants fills his kindly soul with fear 
lest he and his should be torn from their ancient seat. 
The part played by the Press in hastening this divorce 
between the land of England and its owners has im- 
bued him with a hatred of journalism and all its works. 
That his only son should have joined the forces of 
the enemy has been the severest trial of his middle 
age. Moreover, the profession of letters is associated 
in my father’s mind with disreputable surroundings. 
He labels any one who dips a pen into an inkpot as an 
outsider, and a slouch hat, unshaven cheeks, and ram- 
shackle costume as inseparable features to his con- 
ception of a journalist as to Haines’ idea of a Bohe- 
mian. My father’s idea of success is peculiarly his own. 
If he is to acknowledge ability it must proceed along 
recognized lines. Thus he sets his seal of apprecia- 
tion on the position of a Steward of the Jockey Club, 
and withholds it from George Meredith’s. ‘‘Any 
boy can write,” is his point of view, “ since it only 
means thinking of the proper words; but it takes a 
man to judge a horse.” And in the same way, a 
deputy-lieutenant looms larger in his eyes than the 
Member of Parliament for the county. Whatever 
error in birth or upbringing went to the endowing of 
me with the temperament of a Bohemian, my father, 
at any rate, is not responsible for it. I am, and al- 
ways shall remain, a problem to him ; although I doubt 
whether I shall justify the suspicion he harbors that, 


APRIL 


115 


wlien, in the fullness of time, I succeeded to the Place 
and its acres, I shall cut down the trees in the park to 
make paper pulp with, and erect a printing machine 
in the musicians’ gallery. Pride of ancestry is not 
weakened by being planted alongside the modern spirit 
in the soul of a man. I will never degrade the herit- 
age handed down to me by the long line of Hanburys, 
dead and gone, whose portraits keep ceaseless vigil, 
from the walls of my home, over the fortunes of their 
latest descendant. 

I have noticed that fathers never dictate to daughters 
in the way that mothers do to sons. A man realizes 
that his womankind can manage much better for them- 
selves than on any advice he is competent to offer. 
But a woman is always prepared to lay down laws of 
conduct for a sex whose standards are as remote from 
hers as the customs of the Fijians from those of the 
natives of Lapland. My mother’s amiable theory is 
that once get me married, and every anxiety on her 
and her husband’s part of which I am the cause will 
be removed. To her marriage is an institution which 
strains one’s nature free of impurities. A man goes 
into it riotous, extravagant, self-indulgent: he comes 
out a churchwarden, carrying the offertory bag. 

Setting out with this goal in sight, my mother dur- 
ing the whole of my stay at Easter let no oppor- 
tunity pass of airing her views. No allusion was too 
slight, no 09casion inappropriate for her to read me 
a homily on the virtues acquired by ‘‘ double harness,” 
and the vices accruing from single-blessedness. The 
inumber of promising careers amongst our acquaint- 
ances shattered by the latter state of affairs filled me 
with surprise. People I had never suspected of pos- 
sessing any brains apparently would have been in the 


116 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


forefront of their professions had they only married 
in their twenties. Even our solicitor was quoted as 
a potential President of the Law Society but for his 
confirmed bachelor instincts, which had kept him in 
a small country town because the hunting was good. 
I knew for a fact that the man had run away with a 
client’s wife when still articled, so he had shown good 
intentions which might have been allowed to discount 
his later bachelor behavior. When I laid stress on this 
point in his favor my mother’s only form of argu- 
ment was to rebuke me for my bad taste. So like a 
woman to shirk the issue on a question of morality! 

But if my Easter troubles had ended there I 
shouldn’t have minded. A violent acquiescence in those 
prejudices which he disguises to himself as ‘‘patriot- 
ism ” will always turn my father’s thoughts from my 
concerns, and I can generally silence my mother for a 
time by a feigned surrender. I had, however, other 
things on my mind, beginning with George Burn, who 
was with us, in compliance with my sister Dulcie’s 
request that I would bring some man to balance an 
old school friend of hers. Miss Audrey Maitland by 
name, who was staying over the holidays. I obeyed 
the more willingly for George’s own sake. For the 
last two months George has been steering an erratic 
course between Lady Lucy Goring and Kitty Denver, 
the Transatlantic heiress, and I owed it to him to give 
him a change of diet. It is a great fault of George’s 
that he can do nothing by halves. He must not only 
devour the oyster, but the shell as well. And he was 
aided in his inclination for Dulcie’s very attractive 
company by the development of quite a new side to 
her character, a tendency to feminine deceit, coupled 
with a masculine directness of action when it served 


APRIL 


in 


her purpose. The first we knew of a picnic in the 
pine woods was Dulcie’s luncheon announcement that 
Audrey Maitland and myself had planned it the night 
before. Besides the awkward assumption of intimacy 
it raised between us two, whoever heard of a picnic 
in April, and in a pine wood of all places, where the 
needles ’’ spike every portion of one’s anatomy, and 
form undesirable ingredients of the salad and the 
pudding? When the event came off Dulcie made no 
attempt at diplomatic evasion of the duties of chaper- 
onage devolving on her, but disappeared with George 
to look for nests,” leaving Miss Maitland and myself 
to clear away the debris of lunch, and bore each other 
with abstract topics of the kind indulged in by the 
Sunday papers — ‘Ms love at first sight possible, or 
desirable ? ” and “ Do red-haired girls make the best 
wives ? ” On another occasion, when Miss Maitland 
was lying down with a headache, Dulcie invited me to 
motor over to pay a call some ten miles away with 
so touching an exhibition of sisterly solicitude that I 
threw up an expedition I had planned with the keeper, 
only to discover too late that I was expected to drive 
the car, while she sat behind with George. I gave 
them the worst jolting they’re ever likely to have in 
their lives. 

The onlooker, they say, sees most of the game, but 
I was puzzled to know what the game was, and espe- 
cially the part George was playing in it. Full of spir- 
its and bubbling over with vivacity in the company of 
the ladies, George in the smoking-room was to all 
intents and purposes dumb. After one cigarette he 
would wander away on some vague errand or other, 
muttering an explanation of which nobody caught the 
purport. The errand always seemed to end up near 


118 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Dulcie. His sense of humor deserted him, too, and 
he became a fierce champion of the rights of women, 
interspersing his argument with a mass of irrelevant 
observations about the unappreciativeness of brothers, 
and the curse of inappropriate flippancy. In short, 
George's behavior was a powerful plea for the adop- 
tion by Western Europe of the Oriental custom of 
keeping women in strict seclusion. 

But, besides the effect which it might have on 
Dulcie's impressionable and untried feelings, George's 
conduct had a more serious side. His defection left 
me stranded. Rather than become a target for my 
parents' arguments, I gave Miss Audrey Maitland 
the benefit of my society for more hours than I care 
to confess. 

I had been seriously annoyed at finding I was ex- 
pected to play host to a girl friend of Dulcie's, when 
I had hoped for a week's peace from the sex, and I 
had resolved to do as little as I conveniently could in 
the “ squire of dames " line, and leave the visitor to 
find her chief companionship in her workbox and the 
piano. Upon reading Dulcie's letter, I made up my 
mind to dislike Miss Maitland, and it was just as well 
I settled that much beforehand, or, upon being intro- 
duced in the hall, I might have been tempted into a 
contrary opinion. Audrey Maitland had the oval face 
of a Botticelli, a rosebud mouth round which the 
dimples lurked, a coquettish turn of the head, and 
shapely figure held erect, a frankness of manner that 
suggested the most agreeable companionship, and a 
trick of raising the eyes when she answered a question 
that made one want to ask several more. I was so 
prepossessed in the girl's favor that I only just 
stopped myself in time from offering to show her the 


APRIL 


119 


stables. Instead, I looked over her head (it barely 
reached my shoulder) to inquire whether the tap in 
the bathroom was in working order. That Miss 
Maitland giggled showed she had a sense of humor— 
I can forgive much for a sense of humor- 
much, yes, but not a lowering of my own standard of 
self-respect. To employ a military metaphor, I re- 
tired in disorder from the encounter. 

Beauty and brains don't usually go together, but 
Audrey Maitland was as intelligent as she was good- 
looking. She had more than a nodding acquaintance 
with the great classical authors, and took a real in- 
terest in the affairs of the world, in contrast to Dulcie, 
who never opens a paper from one year's end to the 
other. But Miss Maitland wasn't in the least bit a 
‘‘bluestocking," nor an intellectual poseur; her tastes 
in art and literature being her own, and not some one's 
else. In fact, she won my respect by telling me 
that she thought Ruskin a bore, and that the place 
of honor on her shelves was held by Tom Jones, 

We all, even the youngest of us, are liable to make 
mistakes, and the first evening at dinner I concluded 
that, because in a pale blue dress and with a fillet of 
ribbon across her forehead she looked a fit subject 
for a sonnet, I could unload any nonsense on to Miss 
Maitland. Under cover of the butler's clattering the 
fish knives together on the sideboard I said something 
about country air suiting the complexion. 

“ I suppose," remarked Miss Maitland, “ you begin 
by telling every girl that she looks nice." 

“If I can," I replied. 

“You don't give my sex much credit for intelli- 
gence." 

“Because if I draw a conversational check on in- 


1^0 TOO MANY WOMEN 

telligence it is invariably returned to me marked ‘ No 
account/ I don’t put you in that category.” 

“ You’ve merely varied the form of compliment to 
suit the situation. I think compliments silly.” 

So do I, only it’s the fashion to pay them.” 

You say that,” remarked Miss Maitland, “ so that 
I may admire your candor. I believe you’re one of 
those men 'who make love to every 'woman they 
meet.” 

The insinuation stung, and I laid myself out dur- 
ing the next week to prove to the girl its falsity. I 
call most of Dulcie’s friends by their Christian names, 
but Audrey ” never crossed my lips. I may have 
thought of Miss Maitland as ‘‘ Audrey ” once or twice, 
once certainly when I was shaving, for I came down 
with a gash across my cheek as “ wide as a church 
door,” but I was punctilious in keeping up the out- 
ward forms of distant acquaintanceship, a task made 
the more difficult through George’s occupation with 
Dulcie. Even when it poured with rain the whole 
of one day I never suggested ‘‘ cat’s-cradle ” or 
picquet, lest she might have suspected me of getting 
up a flirtation. It is true that we did stay up over the 
billiard-room fire the last night, till my mother sent 
her maid down to ask my companion when she was 
coming up to bed. As it was only 12 . 2,0 it struck me 
as unnecessary surveillance, but I daren’t object, and 
then have my romantic tendencies flung in my face. 

For two hours that evening I sat in an armchair 
on the opposite side of the hearth, and left the choice 
of topics to the lady, severe self-discipline on my part, 
the more so as black suited Audrey Maitland to 
perfection, and she had had the forethought (to call it 
“ coquetry” would be treating her as she treated me) 


APRIL 


121 


to put a red pompon in her hair. We wasted an 
hour and a half of precious solitude before a gorgeous 
wood fire, which invited the building of cloud castles — 
wasted it in cold-blooded common sense. I got more 
and more incoherent in my replies, till Miss Maitland 
gave up her struggle to interest me in rational sub- 
jects, and we both stared into the flames in silence. 
“ There was once a little man,” I suddenly began, 
who lived in the heart of a log all by himself, happy 
and free from care, until his home was put on a big 
hearth and burned to ashes. He found himself all of 
a sudden by the side of a lovely flame quivering with 
beautiful colors, and glowing with passion. Then 
his heart beat furiously, for he had never looked on 
anything so entrancing. ‘ Who are you ? ’ asked the 
little man, as the flame gently caressed his cheek. ‘ I 
am the soul of the log in which you dwelt/ replied 
the flame. ‘Come into my embrace.’ Whereupon 
she folded him in her arms, and he passed away with 
her up the chimney in a puff of smoke.” 

“Which being interpreted means?” — queried Miss 
Maitland, in a drowsy voice. 

“ That as I can’t find happiness up the chimney 
like my friend, I must look for it here.” 

To which inanity Miss Maitland’s reply ought to 
have been interesting had not the maid aforesaid ap- 
peared on the scene and saved the situation. 

Traveling back to town next morning by the early 
train, George had the effrontery to tell me that Dulcie 
and he thought I had seemed “ rather gone ” on the 
girl. In a few pointed words I explained to George 
how unfavorably his conduct must strike any unprej- 
udiced observer. Not only had he flirted abomina- 
bly with the sister of his best friend, but he had left 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


that best friend to meet temptation single-handed. 
But George, like the crafty criminal he is, reserved his 
defense, and read the Morning Post, 

Easter, from every point of view, had been a com- 
plete failure. 


MAY 


Woman is a comedy, which the wise critic hisses off the stage/* 
— “ The Commonplace Book ” of Archie Haines. 






MAY 


The Philosopher in Hyde Park — East of the Sun, 
West of the Moon'^ — Massey champions the 
Stage — A Dialogue at a Dance 

T he London season has begun in earnest, and 
the air is charged with the electricity gen- 
erated from the crowds of fashionable folk flowing 
in carriages and on foot from Hyde Park down Pic- 
cadilly and through the Squares, filling the clubs and 
restaurants all day with well-dressed idlers, occupying 
at night every stall and box at the theaters, and then 
filing up endless staircases amidst roses and smilax to 
shake hands with bediamonded hostesses, and dance 
till dawn. This is the time of year when the man 
about town, discarding the garb of the shires or the 
links, puts on a tail-coat and sits in the Park morning 
and evening; when his cab fares amount to a small 
fortune per diem; when his valet takes in a constant 
stream of parcels full of the latest things in suits and 
hosiery; when his letter box is crammed with dance 
cards from hostesses he has never heard of, but who 
request the pleasure of his company ” ; when he 
raises his hat at intervals of half a minute from morn 
to eve in greeting to his numerous acquaintances; 
when he eats his weight daily in salmon mayonnaise 
and gooseberry tart. 

George Burn holds the theory that the whole 
machinery of season entertainments works to only 
one end — the introducing of the eligible bachelor to 
m 


126 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


the marriageable maid. According to him, a hostess 
dispenses indiscriminate hospitality in order to obtain 
a background against which she can the most efYect- 
ively display her daughter. She scatters four hundred 
invitations for a ball to secure the presence of some 
half a dozen individuals in her house. Personally I 
am indifferent to the motives which have procured my 
attendance at any function so long as the food is good, 
for it is a poor heart that never rejoices in quails and 
plovers’ eggs. But I believe there is something in 
George’s idea. Anyhow, he ought to know, for he 
has been the object of goodness knows how many 
match-making mammas, although he’s barely twenty- 
eight. •. 

George was enlarging on the theme to me the other 
morning in the Park — the place above all others 
where the preliminary skirmishing takes place, and 
the outposts of the rival forces of bachelors and ma- 
trons first sight one another. 

If I were a Society mother,” remarked George, “ I 
would guarantee to get my daughter off my hands in 
a single season.” 

This was George Burn in a new role with a venge- 
ance. 

“Well?” I asked encouragingly. 

George saluted a passing dowager, and proceeded : 

“ On three mornings in the week I should take the 
dear thing in the simplest toilette up and down the 
Row from 11.15 to 12.30 — not oftener, mind you, 
otherwise she’d get the reputation of being a Park 
‘ hack.’ The men with neither birth nor ‘ brass ’ 
behind them I’d just nod to, but wouldn’t I smile on 
a partif I’d flatter him till he was in the seventh 
heaven of gratified vanity, and then Pd disappear to 


MAY 


127 


greet an imaginary friend, leaving him to endow my 
girl with all the charms he had discovered in her 
mother.” 

Here George’s attention wandered for a moment to 
Lady Lucy Goring — under the Countess’s escort. 
Lady Henley is blissfully ignorant of George’s exist- 
ence, so the latter had to be content with a stolen 
glance. 

You had just left your daughter alone,” I ven- 
tured to remind him. 

“ Only for five minutes,” replied George, acting 
the careful chaperon to perfection. “ The roses in 
the girl’s cheeks should not waste their sweetness on 
the desert air of female luncheon parties and after- 
noon ‘ At Homes,’ where the only men present are 
either prehistoric, or married, or both. Her freshness 
should be preserved for the functions frequented 
by bachelors. As for chaperoning at balls, I’d see 
everything without being seen.” 

Quite right, your motto being ^ I’m there, if I’m 
wanted,’ ” and I patted George’s knee. “ The modern 
Jason wants to win his Golden Fleece without en- 
countering the dragon on guard. Go ahead ! ” 

I’d trust my charge’s good sense not to give sup- 
per to a penniless subaltern, nor to encourage atten- 
tions from a man who wouldn’t pass muster in the 
Royal Enclosure at Ascot, and I’d spend my time tell- 
ing those ladies who had announced themselves in the 
Morning Post as forthcoming hostesses, how pretty 
their daughters were. Above all, I would never pose 
before the eyes of a critical world as my girl’s rival 
for its admiration. I’d wear black velvet to set off 
her white frock, and let my tiara draw attention to 
her unadorned wealth of hair,’’ 


128 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


‘‘ What about the entertaining you would do ? I 
asked, chiefly to prevent George from catching sight of 
Miss Kitty Denver, who, with only a maid in attend- 
ance, was coming our way. That young woman had 
not made the journey from Carlton House Terrace 
for nothing. 

‘‘Oh, the usual things,” remarked my unsuspecting 
companion. “A couple of Saturday dinner dances, 
to which the most exclusive woman of my acquaint- 
ance should bring on her party of young people, half 
a dozen Sunday lunches for a favored few, a very 
small and select musical ‘ At Home,’ a table at the 
Eton and Harrow match to collect autumn invita- 
tions at. And I tell you,” exclaimed George, “ my 
success with my eldest daughter would so smooth 
the path of her sisters, that from St. George’s, Han- 
over Square, to Holy Trinity, Sloane Street, the bells 
of the fashionable churches should ring out in my 
praise.” 

“ Hello ! ” I said in astonishment at George’s 
temerity. “ Have you got more daughters coming 
out?” 

“ Lots,” he replied wildly. “ There’s Kitty Den- 
ver; I must go and walk with her.” 

“ And run into the arms of Lucy Goring farther 
down, and make her so jealous that Lady Henley will 
probably discover the whole affair?” 

“ Not much,” said the irresponsible George, as he 
prepared to leave, in spite of my warning. “I shall 
keep my weather-eye open, and dodge around a tree 
trunk on some excuse or other when I’m in the danger 
zone, or else drag Kitty off to the Serpentine. I’ve 
run the pair too long together to be caught out now. 
So long.” And with a wink worthy of the rejuve- 


MAY 


129 


nated Faust, George was gone to his gambling with 
loaded dice. 

But if George, with all his knowledge of the work- 
ing of the female mind, is eminently capable of look- 
ing after himself, there is one of my friends who isn’t 
— Major Griffiths. 

Mrs. Bellew’s arrival in town at all, with the fall 
in agricultural rents having halved her husband’s in- 
come, goes far to substantiate George Burn’s view of 
the Season as a matrimonial agency. Yesterday, in 
the Park, I was just recovering from the shock of 
learning that my favorite partner of last year had got 
engaged — without my leave — to a staff officer in 
Cairo, and the Major was pouring into my ear his 
hopes of pulling off a “ double event ” in the Derby 
and Oaks, when the good lady, with Faith and Sybil 
Bellew, descended on us in a whirlwind of chiffon and 
lace. Like the friend I am, I at once tried to head 
Mrs. Bellew off on to small talk and scandal, but she 
was not to be turned from her purpose by trivialities, 
that purpose being the securing of the Major for a 
theater party. Now Griffiths has an abhorrence of 
such evenings, for he objects to the substitution of a 
hurried meal, with little port and less cigar, for his 
club house dinner and the comfortable hour and a 
half following. In plays his taste runs to a party of 
four men at a musical comedy with a pretty chorus, 
rather than to a representation of simple English life 
during which he is flanked by an ingenue and her 
mother. He likes to spend the intervals between the 
acts in the company of liqueur-brandies, not of ladies. 

Mrs. Bellew showed no mercy, however, to the 
Major’s improvised excuses. 

“ I simply insist upon your coming,” she said, with 


130 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


an affectation of playfulness that ill-concealed the 
determination beneath. ‘‘ It will take you away from 
your horrid club.” 

Some women — Mrs. Bellew is one of them — resent 
the bachelor’s club, for the same reason that huntsmen 
do a fox’s earth — because it lets the hard-pressed 
quarry escape. The Major’s club wasn’t “horrid.” 
As a matter of fact, it was mine also. I told Mrs. 
Bellew as much. 

“We can’t have you interfering,” she replied. 
“ You’re a hardened sinner.” 

“ In what respect ? ” I asked, aggrieved. 

“ We all know that you run away from our society 
to play billiards.” 

I do nothing of the sort, but Mrs. Bellew has never 
forgiven me for spoiling her plans over Sybil. 

“ But the Major,” the lady went on, “ is so good- 
natured that he won’t think of disappointing us.” 

Mrs. Bellew could only descend to flattery of set 
purpose. I began to perceive how accurately George 
had dissected a mother’s mind. 

The Major, meanwhile, stood by, like a naughty 
schoolboy, shuffling his feet. With all our boasted 
superiority of sex, what children we are where women 
are concerned. There was the Major, a blustering 
soldier with a record of distinguished service behind 
him, as helpless as a newborn infant before Mrs. 
Bellew. He didn’t want to accept her invitation, she 
knew that he didn’t want to accept it, and yet in spite 
of his protests that he was dining that night with an 
old friend, that he was under doctor’s orders not to 
stay up after ten o’clock, and that he had to be in 
Ireland on business, Griffiths was forced to submit to 
the dictation of a woman, five feet four inches in 


MAY 


131 


height, whom he could have swung over his shoulder 
with ease, had such a monstrous notion ever occurred 
to him. Her task accomplished, Mrs. Bellew swept 
on down the Row in insolent triumph, leaving the 
Major mopping his brow, and myself chuckling at his 
discomfiture. 

All the same, if Mrs. Bellew succeeds in marrying 
the Major to Faith, it will be a public scandal. What 
the poor fellow wants, but what apparently he can't 
get, is to be left alone. He is about as much domesti- 
cated as a lynx, a talent for brewing punch and bluff- 
ing at poker being slight foundations on which to 
build up married happiness. If Mrs. Bellew must 
find a partner for her daughter, in heaven's name let 
her get some one nearer the girl's age, and leave a 
whisky-and-water-worn veteran in peace! 

With men like George Burn and the Major causing 
me so much anxious thought, I make it a rule to go 
into the background during the Season, and play the 
part of spectator of the “ great game." One keeps 
out of danger oneself, and sees all sorts of funny 
things. As a result, I can forecast most of the So- 
ciety engagements that take people by such surprise 
in the autumn, and I'd guarantee to draw up the cause 
list of the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty division 
of the High Court of Justice with accuracy, merely by 
keeping my eyes ‘‘skinned" from the beginning of 
May to the end of July. When a married woman 
night after night makes her home in ballrooms, she 
can't have a particularly happy one of her own ; when 
a girl's face lights up with animation as a certain part- 
ner claims a dance, I'm not astonished when I fall over 
her foot in the darkest corner of the conservatory 
about 3 A. M. 


1S2 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


My observation has led me to draw up a short list 
of rules for dancing men and debutantes respectively: 

RULES FOR DANCING MEN 

If you are introduced to the belle of the ball, or 
the most sought-after heiress of the day, don’t grumble 
if you can’t get supper with her at the first time of 
asking. She probably has other partners besides 
yourself. N.B. — If you are in the Household Cavalry 
or heir to a peerage, this advice can be neglected. 

When you have exhausted the topics of ‘‘ the floor,” 
‘Hhe band,” and the theaters she has seen, a good 
question to put is ‘‘Do you believe in love at first 
sight?” You are unlikely to meet a girl who has no 
views on this subject, and it also has the advantage 
of leading on to other matters of interest. 

The aphorism “Women are like nettles; they need 
grasping firmly,” is a dangerous one to act upon in- 
discriminately — if you want invitations. “ Qui em- 
brasse, s' emharrasse” as Haines says. 

Don’t despise debutantes. They will grow into 
women — probably pretty ones. 

Never specialize. Other women don’t like it. 

Never compete. It ruffles the hair. Also, if you 
supplant all your rivals, you find yourself loaded with 
unpleasant responsibilities. 

If you don’t know your host, shake hands with all 
the waiters. It will save you missing him. 

Women prefer a rat-catcher who makes love to 
them to an Adonis who doesn’t Join the ranks of 
the rat-catchers. 

Should a chaperon accost you with “I want to 
introduce you to a charming girl,” demur until the 


MAY 


133 


girl in question has been pointed out. Your ideas of 
charm probably differ. 


RULES FOR DEBUTANTES 

Never let one man monopolize you. It’s awkward 
for you when he doesn’t happen to be present. 

Always tear up your programme. It saves the 
memory — ^and your reputation for truthfulness. 

Go back to your chaperon between the waltzes. It 
is a pity to make her climb the back stairs in search 
of you. 

Cultivate dimples. They are irresistible. 

Should a partner tear your dress, smile sweetly and 
say, It doesn’t matter, it’s only an old rag.” He 
will think what an unspoiled, simple nature you have, 
and probably propose. 

If your powers of conversation should fail, use your 
eyes. Their eloquence is unmatched. 

Don’t dance only with soldiers. Civilians cause 
much less anxiety to their wives. 

To be smart one needn’t necessarily say things that 
make other people smart. 

When a man pays you open compliments you may 
be quite certain he thinks you a fool. Cut his next 
dance; he will deserve it. 

Haines is no exception to the rule that Londoners 
know very little about their own city, for when I last 
suggested taking him to the Soho haunts of my news- 
paper days, he asked whether he hadn’t better leave 
his watch and chain at home and take a knuckle- 
duster. Haines and his kind, if by any chance they 
are compelled to cross a line drawn from Oxford 


13 ^ 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Street to Trafalgar Square, do so with an acute sense 
of discomfort at their surroundings, and a desire to 
return with all speed to the familiar landmarks of the 
fountain in Piccadilly Circus, or the arch on Con- 
stitution Hill. They hurry down the Strand like fugi- 
tives from justice, intent only on transacting the busi- 
ness which has ^compelled them to traverse pavements 
crowded with men and women of unknown aspect, 
and ignorant that the most delectable spots imagina- 
ble lie beyond the arbitrary boundary set up by Fash- 
ion. The strange domain spreading around Covent 
Garden and behind Leicester Square is a No Man’s 
Land, a literary and artistic Alsatia, comparable in its 
diversity with the Latin Quarter alone. One door in 
a narrow street admits you to the meeting place of a 
select coterie of authors and actors, where one may 
hear the best of conversation and mimicry; by enter- 
ing another, you can get the finest French cooking for 
a few pence — dandelion salad, kidneys that melt in 
the mouth, an omelette aux fines herbes worthy of 
Paillard’s, and eat the whole in a cosmopolitan com- 
pany ranging in status from a comedian at the music 
hall around the corners, to a mannequin at Lucille’s. 

Haines, perhaps, is hardly the person to appreciate 
the pleasures of Bohemia, since socially he is a 
materialist, a believer in the cutlet for cutlet principle 
of existence, and gives dinners to be dined, calls to be 
asked again, making it his rule to see the ‘‘ tat ” in 
prospect before he offers the ‘Hit.” He has a frank 
contempt, which he shares with my father, for all the 
artistic fraternity. So far as he is concerned, the 
world of ideas does not exist. He recognizes no 
success but the worldly one; to form any value of a 
reputation he must translate it into pounds, shillings 


MAY 


135 


and pence. Dante to him is a grim figure crowned 
with bay leaves, whose meeting with Beatrice forms 
the subject of a famous picture; Shakespeare is a 
dramatist whose plays are acted at His Majesty's 
Theater. Archie Haines is an invaluable tonic to a 
fellow like myself, for his attitude toward life knocks 
all the conceit out of one. When a morning's inspira- 
tion has filled me with a hope that I may some day 
achieve a measure of fame, Haines' question. “ Been 
scribbling lately, old man ? ” reduces my work to its 
proper proportions. 

But this Philistinism has not prevented Haines from 
breaking his orthodoxy on occasions, and accompany- 
ing me to Roche's and ‘‘ the Gourmet," rambling at 
all hours of the day and night through the strange, 
ghost-ridden purlieus of Covent Garden and the 
Strand. We have lunched at the Yorick Club, and 
supped at the Beefsteak, and in the space of eight 
hours have seen more of mankind than could have 
been compassed by eight months of our customary 
routine of hunting, shooting, dancing, and love- 
making. 

It was a stroke of luck that led me to run into 
Steward the other night outside the stage door of the 

Alcazar " when Haines happened to be with me, 
because I should never ‘‘of malice aforethought " have 
arranged a meeting between persons of such antago- 
nistic intellectual standpoints. Haines was taken at a 
disadvantage owing to the green felt hat and flannel 
suit he had put on in deference to my objection to his 
original choice of dress clothes and an opera hat for a 
tour of the town, so instead of assuming a “Weary 
Willie " expression of well-bred superciliousness, he 
returned Steward's greeting with warmth, and showed 


136 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


no sign of astonishment when Mason, the lessee and 
manager of the ‘‘ Alcazar,’’ loomed up out of the 
shadows masking the stage entrance in his massive 
dignity of rings and shirt-studs, and genially shook 
hands all round without any formality of introduction. 

‘‘We’re just off to my place for a business chat,” 
Steward remarked to me, “ but you and your friend 
won’t be in the way if you care to come round too.” 

Haines gave me a wireless telegraphic dig in the 
ribs to signify his assent, so we all linked arms and 
stormed Steward’s rooms in style. 

The seal of that extraordinary man’s originality 
was stamped over his abode. A common, self-con- 
tained flat had been transformed into something un- 
like anything Haines had ever seen. The hall was 
spanned by one of those arches of Moorish fretwork 
in which hung a heavy curtain of Eastern stuff glitter- 
ing with a shower of golden sequins. Across one wall 
stretched a rug of brilliant coloring, the product, so 
Mason assured me, of the Shah’s own factory in 
Teheran; on the other the only ornament was an 
exquisite reproduction of a Holy Family by Murillo, 
before which burned a row of candles in an enamel 
setting. The pulses of Steward’s visitors quickened 
in response to the cunning suggestion of mystery he 
had contrived to convey by his scheme of decoration. 
The first object that caught the eye as the door of the 
sitting-room opened was a bronze replica of the life- 
size head of the Caesar from the Vatican, placed on an 
ebony pedestal to let the representation of immortal 
majesty command the senses. Across the mantelpiece 
ran a fine Flaxman plaque, while in front of the fire- 
place stood a club fender, the seat upholstered in dark 
red morocco to match the prevailing tint of the room. 


MAY 


137 


Bookcases spread around three-quarters of the wall 
space, ending in a large bow window before which 
velvet curtains fell. An old oak knee-desk had been 
drawn aside from its usual place of honor by the 
window, to make way for a supper table laden with 
sandwiches and fruit, displayed on cut glass and silver 
dishes of quite unusual workmanship. A profusion of 
long, low-lying armchairs showed that the presiding 
deity of this combination of luxury and comfort was 
a man. 

Steward had given character to the chamber by 
some unexpected touches. On the walls were posters 
by Willette and Dudley Hardy, a framed ‘‘ Contents 
Bill’^ of the Evening Star announcing the relief of 
Mafeking, and menus of Savage Club guest nights. A 
shelf held the gloves with which Jake Peters won the 
world’s heavy-weight championship in Chicago, and 
a mummied cat, unearthed in making the Law 
Courts’ excavations. On the cottage grand piano, a 
pair of stuffed bantam cocks crowed dumb defiance at 
each other, and raised their steel-shod spurs for battle. 
Well-controlled eccentricity, bizarre common sense, 
were the impressions given by this remarkable apart- 
ment, the effect of which was heightened by the con- 
trasted simplicity of the bedroom opening out of it, in 
which the only furniture were a camp bed and a 
Service chest of drawers. 

I waved my hand with a showman’s gesture for 
Haines’ benefit. 

‘‘ This is the real thing, my young friend. On the 
right” (here I indicated Caesar) “you will observe 
the death-mask of our host’s maternal grandfather; 
on the left is a frugal meal provided on the principle 
that ‘ better is a dinner of herbs where love is, than 


138 


TOO -MANY WOMEN 


a stalled ox and hatred therewith/ All the proceeds 
of writing a few catchy lyrics for the light opera 
stage ! ” 

Haines’ disconcern at the difference between his 
idea of a literary den- and the reality was comical. 
His gaze wandered round and round the room. 

‘‘ It certainly seems a paying job,” he remarked at 
length. 

‘‘ Never forget, my dear fellow,” came the voice of 
Mason from the recesses of the armchair in which he 
had sunk with a cigar, “ that if the rewards of theat- 
rical management and authorship are sometimes great, 
so are the responsibilities. There is the popular taste 
to gauge, the welfare of the profession to secure, the 
artistic standards to be maintained. The talents to 

win success ” But here Steward, who had just 

donned a purple-lined smoking jacket, cut the impre- 
sario short. 

None of that. Mason. If you want to get out the 
Vox Humana stop, you don’t do it here. I don’t 
much mind looking at you, but I’m hanged if I’ll 
listen to you elevating the masses. What about those 
new songs? I’ve got the idea for one number, just 
the thing for the chorus of ‘ flappers.’ It begins — 

* Oh, the “ dolce far niente ” 

When the maiden isn’t twenty.^ 


It wants a slap-dash accompaniment on these lines,” 
and, going to the piano. Steward thumped out a suc- 
cession of tuneful chords, till the fighting cocks rocked 
again. A sudden burst of sound from the hall inter- 
rupted the improvisation, the door flew open, and a 
woman’s voice exclaimed, ‘‘You are enjoying your- 
selves. I thought you told Kit and me, Mr. Steward, 


MAY 


139 


we should be the only guests, and we find the place 
overflowing.” 

I turned in alarm. “ Well, I’m damned,” I said 
feebly, and fell into a chair. It was Cynthia — 
Cynthia in a crimson opera cloak, and wearing my 
earrings. 

Her face lit up with smiles. 

‘‘Why, if it isn’t dear old Gerald! Gerald, I am 
glad to see you.” 

Steward surveyed us with an amused expression. 
“ Right again, it is dear old Gerald, and that’s dear 
old Haines, and in that chair, trying to attract your 
attention with a fat forefinger, is dear old Mason.” 

Cynthia turned to her companion, none other than 
the “ Alcazar ” leading lady. “ Is he often taken like 
this ? ” and she pointed to her host. Then she placed 
one hand on my head and gently stroked it. “ Don’t 
be absurd, Mr. Steward, I’ve known this boy for 
years.” 

“ That’s no reason why you should ruffle my hair! ” 
I spoke gruffly. 

“ Diddums didn’t like it,” mimicked Steward. 
Haines and Mason both laughed. 

I sprang to my feet. “If you’ve no sense of the 
ridiculous, Miss Cochrane, I have. Please to remem- 
ber that you are in the presence of strangers.” 

Cynthia made a face at me — an outrageous action 
on her part. “ Gerald, they’re not strangers. I’ve 
had tea with Mr. Mason heaps of times, and your 
friend there has such a nice face I couldn’t feel strange 
with him.” 

“That’s right,” broke in Haines enthusiastically. 
“ You come and have a sandwich with me, and we’ll 
forget that dignified dog, Hanbury ! ” 


140 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


When it comes to sandwiches, IVe got no dig- 
nity,” I shouted, and made for the table. ‘‘ Here’s a 
toast ! ” and I filled a glass with champagne, the rest 
of the company following suit. ‘‘Man and the con- 
fusion of Woman.” 

“ I call that downright ungallant,” growled Steward, 
munching a lobster patty. 

“ Gerald doesn’t mean all the nasty things he says,” 
Cynthia made reply in those caressing tones of hers. 
A mist swept across my sight, but with an effort I 
brushed it away. 

“ ril give you another toast,” I said. “ Miss Coch- 
rane — the confusion of all of us.” Every glass was 
drained. Silence ensued for a space while we de- 
voured the good things Steward had provided. 

“ Some one play something,” Mason began at last, 
producing a large case of cigars from his pocket. 
“ We’ve got a ‘ premiere danseuse ’ here, and the op- 
portunity is not to be missed.” 

Now Haines, for all his Philistinism, has an incom- 
parable knack of taking the poorest tune, supplying 
the rhythm, and swing it lacks, and weaving a har- 
mony of sound to set lame folks dancing, and dumb 
folks singing. From a merry jingle he will swing 
into a “ can-can,” thence into a “ tarantella,” turn that 
fierce, passionate music into the dreamiest waltz, from 
which he will glide into the sobbing refrain of a 
Neapolitan love song. On this occasion he seated 
himself at the piano, flourished his hands about in 
caricature of a famous maestro, ran up and down 
the scales lightly once or twice with a tantalizing 
mastery of touch, as a preliminary to the most seduc- 
tive melody it had ever been the lot of any of us to 
hear. To the echo of the silvery notes all of us in our 


MAY 


141 


several ways paid homage; Mason’s eyes closed in 
reverie, Steward’s keen expression relaxed in a far- 
away vision of the Palace Beautiful, Kit of the “ Al- 
cazar,” whose soul was in her feet, beat soft time to 
the magical music, while Cynthia and myself sat 
before the wreckage of the supper lost in daydreams. 

Great Scott, the fellow can play ! ” muttered 
Mason, half to us, half to himself, and dissolved the 
spell which bound the room. The time quickened, 
and a wicked little note crept into the soft bars of 
the treble to wake our slumbering selves responsive 
to its call. A dry whisper of enticement ran round 
the circle as the power of the chords gripped it, giv- 
ing to each one the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of 
Good and Evil. The sins of all the cities stalked in 
our midst. Haines was unlocking doors that are best 
kept bolted and barred. 

Stop that infernal noise,” shouted Steward in a 
harsh voice I scarcely recognized as his, ‘‘ before you 
drive us mad. Play something that Kit can dance 
to.” 

The rebuke was effectual. The dreadful music 
changed to the glory and sunshine of a Southern Car- 
nival. In our ears rang the shouts of the masquerad- 
ers, in our nostrils rose the scent of the perfumed 
South, for Steward had placed a lighted pastille on a 
shovel, filling the air with aromatic odors. I hastily 
cleared a wide space free of chairs and et ceteras as Kit 
rose to her feet and began to dance, slowly, almost 
mechanically, in obedience to the fascination of the 
music, with no volition of her own to direct her move- 
ments. I believe she was in a species of hypnotic 
trance, or she would never have done what she did, 
for although I have seen gipsies in Seville, Dervishes 


142 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


in Algiers, Tziganes in Budapest, and the most 
renowned ‘‘ ballerinas ” of Paris and St. Petersburg, 
Kit of the “ Alcazar ” surpassed them all at the bid- 
ding of Haines. He, equally, was under some spell, 
for he left the rank of tolerable musicians he occupies 
ordinarily and became inspired. In a mist of sound, 
Kit hovered and swayed to the call of the measure, 
floating in the eddying fumes of the pastille. She 
alternately pirouetted and sank, her feet flickered now 
high, now low, till she appeared no longer a woman, 
but a phantom in the moonbeams. Mason sat bolt 
upright staring at her as if thunderstruck at the quali- 
ties he had never seen displayed on the stage of the 
‘‘ Alcazar,” and which, if he could conjure up in the 
future, would mean a fortune to the pair. At the 
last, when the piano was rising to a crescendo of sav- 
age frenzy. Steward tore off his smoking jacket and 
flung himself into the circle, capering and leaping with 
a demoniac possession, lashed out of his ordered self 
by the wild bars throbbing with passion and abandon. 
With one final effort he spun his partner round at 
giddy speed, to hurl her into one chair and himself 
into another, as the music stopped with a crash. 

Haines rose with a. streaming forehead. ‘‘The 
devil’s in here to-night,” he said shortly. 

Mason cast an apprehensive glance around, Cynthia 
gave a shudder and gripped my hand. The environ- 
ment created by Steward for his own delight was, I 
felt convinced, the force that oppressed us. His mag- 
netic personality, translated into concrete form in his 
flat and its contents, carried us, like the Wild Ass’s 
Skin of Balzac’s romance, to a region outside ordinary 
human existence. No sound from the world came 
through the heavy curtains; nothing in our surround- 


MAY 


143 


mgs reminded us of it. The somber coloring of the 
walls, the gleam of old silver on the table, the strange 
relics, the fantastic objects on every hand, conveyed 
the certainty that there convention was unknown, its 
code unrecognized. If the devil was in the room, as 
Haines suggested, he would find himself in a spot as 
unearthly as his own abode. 

There are no devils except those we raise for our- 
selves,’’ Steward replied, with grim intensity. 

A sob broke from Kit, who was in the full flood of 
reaction from an excitement which had overtaxed her 
strength. 

‘‘ Don’t frighten the ladies with extracts from your 
Bohemian philosophy,” I exclaimed, with an effort at 
jocularity. “ They’re more than half persuaded that 
you practice the Black Art.” 

Mason came forward. I’m going to take them 
home in my car,” he said, with a gesture toward Kit 
and Cynthia, who was bending over her. Then he 
turned to Haines. “ I’ll give you a box for my show 
with pleasure, sir, whenever you care for one. You 
knock spots off any ivory thumper I’ve ever listened 
to, and you’ve given me a better opinion of my lead- 
ing lady than I’ve ever had reason to hold before.” 

Haines flushed at the compliment, but remained 
silent. He was a little unstrung by the sensations of 
the night. To tell the truth, I was precious glad 
myself to be out in the street at the end of it all. 
Steward’s taste for the fantastic wants tempering with 
fresh air. As for his mummied cat — the sooner it is 
cremated the better ! 

I had forgotten all about the part I had unwittingly 
played in the affair of Clive Massey, undergraduate. 


144j 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


and Alice Howard, of the Firefly Theater, till the 
following letter, bearing the Oxford postmark, recalled 
the whole business to my memory : 

Dear Hanbury : 

“I hope you won’t think it odd of me to ask you 
to lend me £20. I’ll take it as a very friendly act if 
you will, because I can’t go to my people, as they will 
be sure to ask questions which I shan’t be able to an- 
swer and respect a third person’s confidences. You 
are a man of the world and will understand. 

** Yours ever, 

Clive Massey.” 


I felt pleased with my reply : 

“ Dear M. : 

“ The money is yours. Come and gnaw a bone 
ches moi and Sunday, and meet a pal of mine, Drum- 
mond, who is playing at the ‘ Firefly ’ and is full of 
fun. 

“ Yours, till hell freezes, 

“G. H.” 

I knew that last touch would fetch Massey as no 
other inducement could, and sure enough he accepted, 
with many protestations of gratitude, by return of 
post, forgetting, in his haste, to stamp the envelope, 
and mulcting me accordingly for the luxury of obtain- 
ing a reply. 

Drummond turned up first in my rooms, magnifi- 
cent as usual, the details of his costume bearing the 
same relation of civilian dress that objects seen under 
the microscope do to the ordinary unmagnified world. 


MAY 


145 


His coat was too pinched at the waist, the pattern of 
his trousers was too stripy, and his tie was a huge 
‘‘ four-in-hand ” sticking out an inch from his neck, 
carrying a fox’s head in brilliants as a centerpiece. I 
took advantage of Drummond’s punctuality to run 
over the salient points of L’ Affaire Massey ” for his 
benefit, hinting that if he could contrive to disillusion- 
ize Massey about the constancy of coryphees I, and 
many others, would be duly grateful. 

The culprit arrived twenty-five minutes late, with a 
hair-bracelet on his left wrist, a suspicion of powder 
on the sleeve of his coat, and a preoccupied spirit that 
took no interest in Middlesex v. Surrey at the Oval, 
when that topic was broached to break an awkward 
silence. I never saw symptoms I liked less in a 
youth of twenty-one. In desperation I unmasked my 
batteries, and asked Drummond whether the Cock 
and the Hen was in for a long run at the “ Firefly.” 
With the scent red-hot, Massey gave tongue, like a 
well-trained hound, proceeding to enlighten us on 
such intimate points of the piece as the new dresses 
for the ‘‘ Bombay ” number, the choice of another 
understudy for the soubrette part, the rumor circu- 
lating about such and such an individual in the cast. 

You might be there yourself,” said Drummond, 
‘‘you’ve got all the latest tips. Here’s one for you 
hot from the oven — steer clear of stage ladies. The 
Sirens weren’t in it with them; I know.” And he 
slapped his breast dramatically. 

Massey leaned across the table, and put his sleeve in 
the custard. 

“You’ve met the wrong sort, then. There are 
girls with ideals, with ambitions to leave this world a 
little better than they found it.” 


140 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Yes, and themselves a great deal better off. 
There’s one girl in oiir show,” began Drummond, 
clearing his throat, “ who is a born actress off the 
stage, whatever she may be on it. She looks a simple 
little thing, yet she makes others look a jolly sight 
simpler before she’s done with them. She meets a fel- 
low ‘rolling in it’ and she tells him she despises 
money. Of course he sets about spending as much as 
possible on this rare flower of unworldly virtue. An- 
other Johnny learns that the beautiful creature with 
the soulful eyes can’t afford a heart amidst the temp- 
tations of the theater. ‘ Men are so cruel,’ she lisps. 
‘ They never think of the damage they do.’ He comes 
to the conclusion that she loves him for himself alone. 
But she never lets him alone.” 

Drummond paused for a moment to pull his cuffs 
straight. “ Then she strikes a chivalrous man like 
you, mon ami, and she works the ‘ ideals ’ touch, talks 
about the struggle for success, tells you that she finds 
your society so precious to her in helping her to be 
true to her best self.” ■ Here Massey gave a jump 
as if he had been sitting on a “ live ” rail. “ She yarns 
you all this over five-pound luncheons, and four- 
pound suppers, and motor car trips that cost you a 
‘ tenner.’ As the door closes on your retreating form 
after a long day together, she sits down and writes 
to another ‘ boy ’ what a mug you are, and will he take 
her down the river for a change. When your account 
is overdrawn, and you have borrowed all the money 
you can from friends. Miss Alice Howard says ‘ Good- 
by,’ and some other fellow sits in the stall you have 
warmed so long.” 

Drummond had most certainly hit several nails very 
hard on the head, for Massey’s face was a study. It 


MAY 


147 


got more and more flushed as the graphic description 
proceeded until it was nearly purple with astonish- 
ment or rage — I couldn’t make out which — and its 
possessor finally scattered all doubts by striking the 
table such a blow that the glasses skipped in all direc- 
tions. 

My God!” he shouted. ‘'No wonder the stage 
is criticised as a profession for girls, when the base 
gossip of the ‘ wings ’ is repeated to damage a woman’s 
character by men like you.” 

Drummond’s lips tightened, but he only shrugged 
his shoulders. Massey’s torrent of melodramatic 
speech rushed on. 

“You don’t know Miss Howard. I have that 
honor. She’s the sweetest, dearest, honestest little 
woman in the world. The things she’s gone through 
would knock the stuffing out of most men. A wid- 
owed mother is kept from want by her sacrifices. 
Alice is quite right when she says that the curse of the 
profession is the malice and jealousy of rivals. I 
understand her. Men like you never will. She’s 
above you.” 

“ Her father is a ‘ bookie,’ and alive and kicking, 
if you want to know,” Drummond replied, in as calm 
a voice as he could command ; “ but I don’t suppose 
you do. And look here, if you are going to champion 
the cause of every actress who lets you spend money 
on her, you’ve got your work cut out. Also, you 
needn’t be rude in the process.” 

Massey was too enraged to accept any evidence 
against the woman who had cast a spell over his young 
affections. After all, I don’t think at his age I should 
have listened to Drummond’s indictment in a becom- 
ing spirit, especially as in several particulars its truth 


148 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


had caught Massey “ on the raw.” But I was scarcely 
prepared for “ Sir Galahad’s ” attitude to myself. 

“ I won’t take your money, Hanbury,” he said. 
‘‘Your invitation was nothing but a ‘plant ’ to insult 
Miss Howard.” 

I felt justifiably annoyed. 

“Don’t be absurd, Massey; Miss Howard may be 
an angel from heaven, for all I know. Perhaps it 
would be a good thing if she had wings to fly away 
from the impressionable front row of the stalls. But 
you’ve no right to quarrel with your friends because 
you happen to be in love with a chorus girl.” 

“ My only friends are Alice’s,” Massey replied 
sententiously. 

Drummond whistled through his teeth. “Then 
you’ve a queer visiting list, beginning with the King 
of the Kaffir Market, down to the latest subaltern in 
the ‘ Blues.’ ” 

“Shut up,” I interrupted. “You’ve given the 
fellow quite a big enough dose for one day.” 

“ Mr. Drummond’s opinions are of no interest to 
me,” said Massey, picking up his hat and umbrella, 
and he went with no more ceremony than a District 
Visitor from a cottage. 

I was the first to recover the power of speech'. “ I’m 
going into action straight away. Do you happen to 
know Miss Howard’s address?” 

Drummond produced a crushed leather pocket- 
book, and consulted its pages. “Number 14. Uni- 
versity Mansions,” he read out, and I jotted down the 
particulars on my cuff. 

“ ’Ware wire, Hanbury,” Drummond went on, 
“ and look out when you come to the water- jump, it’s 
devilish deep and the landing’s bad on the other side.” 


MAY 


149 


“ ril keep a good grip on the filly’s mouth,” I said. 

Thanks, old man. I may want your help by and 
by.” 

“ It’s yours for the asking/’ and so saying Drum- 
mond took himself off. I reached for a pipe. As the 
smoke wreaths rose around my head, I sketched out 
my plans. 

Heaven spare me from another ball like the Bra- 
tons’! I fought my way up the stairs by dint of a 
quarter of an hour’s vigorous elbow work, only to 
have my toes stamped to a jelly and receive several 
knockout blows in the chest from couples going 
through the farce of waltzing. The friends I did see 
I couldn’t reach through the crush. If I had reached 
them I wouldn’t have heard their voices in the uproar. 

Lady Braton, at the head of the stairs, was tossed 
hither and thither by the flood of her guests, two- 
thirds of whom she had never seen before, and who, 
on their part, didn’t care if they never saw her again. 
Their names had been put on somebody’s list to 
receive invitations, so they came, chattering in loud 
tones about their own affairs, impartially ready to 
criticise the hostess’s diamonds, or the supper. The 
idebutante daughter of the house stood by her mother’s 
side, with a large bouquet in her hand to distinguish 
her from other girls, frightened by the whirl of 
strange faces surging past her, feeling as though she 
was at some masquerade. Lady Braton had preferred 
to ask strangers to her own friends, because the latter 
were not smart enough, and she wanted the dancing 
set to come and invite Miss Braton back in turn to 
their own entertainments. The bargain was perfectly 
well understood. 


150 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


‘‘ To-night you are eating my cutlets,” Lady Braton 
said in effect to every one as she shook hands, a set 
smile of welcome frozen on her face. ‘‘ When you 
are grilling cutlets of your own in the next two 
months, think of my daughter and myself, and let us 
join you in picking the bones clean.” And to the 
credit of the majority, let it be said, they would 
answer the appeal. 

As for myself I never touch cutlets, so I merely 
felt angry at being made to waste a summer's night in 
overheated rooms, when I might have been sleeping 
peacefully, or listening to George's latest romantic 
exploit. The crowd annoyed me. I was jammed 
against the wall by First and Second Secretaries to 
different Embassies, who regaled themselves by 
scandalous little stories in French about the people 
present. I learned that “ The Captain ” called twice a 
day at the corner house in Charles Street, and that 
the tall blonde, who was being chaperoned by the 
Dowager Marchioness of Pendinning, had begun her 
season as a brunette. When I escaped by main force 
from my compromising position, it was to fall (liter- 
ally so) into the arms of a woman I can’t stand, be- 
cause she will always ask me to eat a plain dinner 
and meet a plain daughter. One can carry asceticism 
too far, so I make a point of refusing. Dancing was 
out of the question. I looked around for a supper 
partner. Molly Hargreaves was no good, for she 
looked on appetite in a man as a sign of vulgarity, 
and only nibbled at a quail herself; Hester Vaughan 
was sure to be waiting for that fellow in the 3rd Bat- 
talion. I had just fixed on a maiden whose avoirdu- 
pois promised well, when Audrey Maitland brushed 


MAY 


151 


past me. All thoughts of food vanished. I secured 
the next dance, and steered her on to the balcony. 

There was an irresistible challenge to me in the 
poise of Miss Maitland's head with its crown of Titian 
red curls, in the grace with which she leaned over the 
balustrade watching the square below, in the soft tones 
of her voice which woke an answering echo in me. 
I struggled hard against the attraction she radiated, 
for I feel nothing but contempt for the man who suc- 
cumbs to the fascination of a woman, and proves false 
to the independence which is the birthright of his sex. 

You haven't much to say to me, now I have given 
you a dance," said my partner, destroying the barrier 
of silence I had erected between us as safeguard. 

I was thinking of a topic." 

That's not a very courteous reply.” 

** I'm sick to death of courtesy," I said. ‘‘ It's only 
mistaken for weakness. Give me the good old days 
when we seized the women we wanted, threw them 
across our saddlebows, and rode off in triumph." 

“Mr. Hanbury!" 

“ I mean every word of it." 

“ You're a barbarian." 

“ We all are," I replied with emphasis. “ Scratch 
the dancing man " — Miss Maitland drew back in dis- 
gust — “ and you find the savage," I continued 
placidly. “We're all stained with woad, really, and 
we've only left our clubs in the cloakroom.” 

“ Where do women come in this refined theory of 
yours?” Miss Maitland said icily. “You don't put 
them in a very high category if you imagine they 
submit to the brutality of your sex." 

“ Bless your heart, they much prefer to be driven 


15 ^ 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


than to drive. Look at Mrs. Fletcher there ! ” — a very 
stately woman passed across the window with the 
undersized individual who was her husband — Every 
one knows that she runs the show, and is miserable in 
consequence.’’ 

Mrs. Fletcher is Mrs. Fletcher,” was the reply ; 
“ but I have a better opinion of you than you give me 
credit for.” 

Flatterer!” 

Miss Maitland looked at me with a puzzled expres- 
sion. What do you mean ? ” 

‘‘ I’m not going to have you turn my head with 
compliments, and become sentimental, against all your 
theories, too. I, a weak-headed man, may succumb 
to the soft murmurs of the night, and the star-strewn 
sky, and the fascination of your presence. You, a 
strong-minded woman, mayn’t.” 

‘‘ I never heard such nonsense ! ” exclaimed Miss 
Maitland. think you must be mad.” 

“ I’m as sane as I ever am, or ever could be with 
you.” I spoke rapidly, for my companion showed 
signs of fright. You can’t shift the blame on to me. 
I was doing splendidly, resisting the temptation to say 
how much I like you, and what a spell you cast over 
my senses, and then you spoil it all deliberately by 
telling me you have a good opinion of me. It’s too 
bad,” and I copied Miss Maitland’s example and got 
up. She had turned a rosy pink. ‘‘ May I have 
another dance later on ? ” I continued boldly. 

The girl steadied her voice with difficulty. I’m 
very angry with you, and I shan’t dance with you 
again.” 

Won’t she, though, at the next ball I meet her at ! 


JUNE 


Wives are young men's mistresses, companions 
age, and old men's nurses ." — Francis Bacon, 


for middle 
‘ Essays.” 


I 


JUNE 


The Capture of Major Griffiths — ^An Actress Inter- 
viewed — Family Cares — Miss Audrey Maitland 
goes to Royal Ascot and returns 

W E were all sitting in the Club on Sunday, re- 
cuperating, in the ecstasy of after-luncheon 
coffee and cigars, from the fatigue of Church Parade, 
when Haines, at his strategic position in the corner 
window overlooking Hamilton Place, suddenly an- 
nounced that the Major was tottering across the road 
as though he had one foot in the grave and the other 
in his coffin. Two minutes later Griffiths rolled into 
the room much as if it had been the deck of a liner 
in the Bay of Biscay, sank into the nearest chair, with 
a groan, and wiped the perspiration from his face 
with a bandanna as scarlet as his complexion. 

‘‘ Cheer up. Major,’’ said Haines. ‘‘ Even if your 
bank has ‘bust’ you can always borrow a ‘fiver’ 
from your tailor ! ” 

The Major reached out a trembling hand, sounded 
a little bell on the table beside him, and ordered a 
port-glassful of ’48 brandy. Then he made several 
ineffectual attempts to strike a match, accepted a light 
from George Burn, let his cigar go out twice, and 
spilled a third of the brandy over his coat as he raised 
it to his lips. Altogether it was a sad sight. 

“ The old man’s had a nasty knock,” whispered 
Haines. “ I haven’t seen him so shaky since he took 
that toss with Fernie’s hounds and nearly broke his 
neck,” 


155 


156 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


‘‘What’s wrong, Major?” I asked. “Were you 
‘welshed’ yesterday at Kempton?” 

“ Have they blackballed your candidate at the 
Rag ? ” suggested George. 

“Or has she refused you again?” put in Haines, 
capping our random remarks with one still more 
absurd. 

The Major’s reply was incredible. 

“She has accepted me.” 

Haines bent forward. “ Look here, old fellow, we 
were only chaffing. Don’t mind that ass, George!” 
— George was tapping his forehead significantly. — 
“Let’s talk about something cheerful. You’ll soon 
feel better.” 

“ Accepted me.” The Major repeated the words 
with dull despair. He reminded me of a man driven 
mad by an appalling calamity, whose ruined brain 
held nothing but the last impression registered before 
sanity had fled. All the same, I suspected the dread- 
ful truth. Griffiths’ military training prevented him 
from ever doing the unexpected. 

George screwed his monocle in, and looked the 
Major up and down. 

“If you go on in that morbid strain,” he said, “ I 
shall make it my business to get a committal order 
signed by two magistrates, and put you in a place 
where you can gibber nonsense to your heart’s con- 
tent. But don’t do it here, Griffiths, where there’s a 
brass match-stand handy and a hot-tempered chap 
like ‘yours truly.’ You engaged!” George con- 
fronted the wretched soldier as though he were the 
agent of divine vengeance. “ Why, you’re the most 
confirmed bachelor I know ! ” 

If this admonition was meant to rouse Griffiths to 


JUNE 


157 


a sense of his position, it failed lamentably. Instead, 
moistening his parched lips with another draught of 
liqueur brandy, he croaked out the two words “ Mrs. 
Bellew,’’ and then stuck fast in the effort at coherent 
speech. 

But here I felt that I was in a position to clear up 
the mystery of the Major. 

‘‘ Griffiths wishes to announce,” I said, “ that he is 
engaged to Miss Faith Bellew. Isn’t that it, Major? ” 

Thus addressed, Griffiths nodded his head in mute 
confirmation. 

I could picture the whole scene — Mrs. Bellew stand- 
ing with one hand on the Major’s shoulder, stroking 
Faith’s head with the other, and smiling in triumph 
on her future son-in-law. “ So you are going to take 
my little girl from me ? ” — I fancied I could hear Mrs. 
Bellew say it — with a convenient rearrangement of 
the true facts typical of that modern matron, for, to 
speak plainly. Faith had been thrust into the Major’s 
arms with a mother’s blessing from the moment that 
he first made the girl’s acquaintance. Mrs. Bellew 
has a giant’s strength, and uses it like a giant. 

‘‘Who says the age of miracles is past?” asked 
George Burn, of nobody in particular. 

“ It seems funny losing you like this, Major,” re- 
marked Haines, ‘^when you looked like staying the 
course.” 

Griffiths gave a meditative frown. The secret of 
his impending fate once out, he was regaining his 
composure. 

“ There’s a sort of ‘ now-the-laboreFs-task-is-done ’ 
feeling that isn’t half bad,” he said. “ I can look on 
and see you youngsters make fools of yourselves with 
some satisfaction.” 


158 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


A queer sentiment for a newly engaged man,” I 
remarked. “I’d be sorry for you if Mrs. Bellew 
heard it.” 

“ That’s a wonderful woman.” The Major’s voice 
rang with real enthusiasm. “ She knows what one’s 
going to say before one opens one’s mouth. I’d 
barely got into the house last night when she took 
my hand with, ‘ I wonder whether you’ve got some- 
thing to tell me?’ So I had, by Gad, but not what 
she thought.” 

“ What do you think she expected ? ” asked George, 
with a laugh. “ A request for the loan of a sovereign 
to pay the hansom with ? It was a hansom ? ” 

Griffiths actually blushed. 

“ Yes. Mrs. Bellew couldn’t wait till the end of the 
Opera.” 

“ Of course,” J said. “ And you had the box to 
yourselves most of the time, while dear, unsophisti- 
cated Mrs. Bellew looked up her friends across the 
house.” 

“ What a suspicious chap you are, Hanbury,” 
growled the Major. “ Can’t you give a woman credit 
for wanting to see her friends? ” 

“ Certainly,” I replied. “ I give a woman with 
marriageable daughters credit for anything.” 

But I didn’t flatter myself that the truth of my 
remark penetrated very far into Griffiths’ intelligence, 
because the mood of self-abasement in which he had 
entered the Club had given way to an intense satisfac- 
tion at having secured a wife. He began to enlarge 
on the fact, and it was thus that, bit by bit, George, 
Haines and myself were able to draw the whole story 
of his wooing from the Major without letting him 
realize how sorry a part he had played in the old, old 


JUNE 


159 


game, in which Woman's duplicity is matched against 
Man's weakness. 

Feeling that no good could result to himself from 
the attention which Mrs. Bellew lavished on him at 
every meeting, the Major had begun by spurning the 
invitations which, ever since the first week in May, 
had descended on his club and chambers from that 
quarter. But as the only consequence of returning 
no answer was that Mrs. Bellew called to make per- 
sonal inquiries as to his state of health, Griffiths found 
it the better policy to temporize in such phrases as, “ I 
will try to look in if I can," and ‘‘ You may see me at 
lunch, but don't wait." Even then, at the next time 
of meeting, on one of those chance occasions of which 
the Season is. so prodigal, Mrs. Bellew, instead of 
blaming the delinquent soldier for his non-appearance, 
worked on his remorse bred of encountering her with 
no ready excuse, and carried him off to some function 
at which Faith was due to appear. 

‘‘Most women would have cut me for giving 'em 
the chuck so often," naively explained the Major, 
“ but Mrs. Bellew, like the real good sort she is, said 
she knew I was a busy fellow, and they were only too 
glad to take me when they could get me." 

Mrs. Bellew added further to her prestige in her 
victim's estimation by giving him, whenever he did 
go to Green Street, — the site of her temporary abode 
for the season , — carte blanche to do as he liked, take 
a nap after lunch, smoke in the drawing-room, or ob- 
tain the hostess's undivided attention and sympathy 
for his stories, and his woes. Installed as a friend of 
the family, his advice sought on such intimate details 
of domestic economy as the choice between apple 
and emerald green for Sybil Bellew’s new frock, and 


160 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


what books should be ordered from the circulating 
library, Griffiths turned a flattered gaze on the fair 
Faith, who, in obedience to the strategist at head- 
quarters, showed a smiling face to his rubicund one. 
As he crunched the stuffed quail, and drank the dry 
champagne of the Bellew hospitality, the source of all 
these good things took on a more favorable guise to 
the Major. The lady of the house appeared no longer 
as an ogress in wait for his bachelorhood, but an 
enchantress waving soft spells of satiety and ease. 
Leaning back in his chair, a prime cigar from Bel- 
lew's special box between his teeth. Faith seen in 
profile before the window, Griffiths’ thoughts turned 
involuntarily in the direction which Mrs. Bellew 
desired. That good mother, in partnership with her 
cook, fitted her guest with rose-colored spectacles 
through which marriage with the sylph in the window 
seat appeared highly desirable. 

Accident at last accomplished what design had 
planned. Taken to the Opera by his would-be 
mother-in-law, the Major had been induced by circum- 
stances, in which chance played no part, to accompany 
Faith back to Green Street in a hansom. Musing, as 
he explained, on a new golf grip rather than on his 
companion, Griffiths had clutched an imaginary 
brassie, only to find it was Faith’s hand he had im- 
prisoned within his. The Major felt compelled by 
a sense of honor to justify his involuntary action by 
a pretty speech, from which he progressed with fatal 
fluency into a tender one. A sudden jolt of the cab 
threw Faith against his manly chest, and there some- 
how she remained. 

“Upon my word, I couldn’t tell you how it hap- 
pened,” the hero of the episode assured us, “ but when 


JUNE 


161 


we reached Green Street Faith had promised to be- 
come my wife.” 

‘‘ And you richly deserved it,” said Archie Haines, 
with the confidence of the man who has never been 
tempted. 

“ There, but for the grace of God, sits George 
Burn,” remarked that individual, forgetting that, were 
justice meted out to him, he would be saddled with 
far more than a single wife. 

It was an act of expiation on my part, for the mirth 
I indulged in, to accept the post of best man which 
the Major thrust upon me. I bet I make a hash of it. 

I should probably have done nothing in the matter 
of Massey and his star of the stage, in spite of my 
emphatic statement to Drummond on the occasion of 
Massey’s tantrums at my luncheon, had it not been 
for a fine day last week finding me unemployed about 
three o’clock, with no calls to work off my energy on. 
Archie Haines, who has freely prophesied a catas- 
trophe from Massey’s impetuosity throwing discretion 
to the winds, and his banking account into overdrafts, 
warned me against pulling out another fellow’s chest- 
nuts from the fire. 

‘‘You’ll get no thanks from either side,” he had 
said, “and you’ll make the girl think that she’s got 
hold of a good thing in ‘mugs’ if his friends start 
routing her up.” 

“ But I’m only going to prospect,” I protested. 

“ I know your sort of prospecting,” Haines replied. 
“ The next thing we’ll hear of will be that you are 
footing a dressmaking bill, or making the fortunes of 
a florist.” 

But when my sense of adventure is once roused, 


162 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Haines could pour the wisdom of Solomon into my 
ears in vain. I pay the conventions an outward trib- 
ute of respect as befits a man of the world, but in 
reality I give them scant courtesy. In my veins flows 
the blood of the South. I draw nothing from the 
cautious and unromantic North, save my income. 

On the afternoon in question, the idea of calling 
upon Miss Alice Howard of the Firefly ” came upon 
me like an inspiration. I was sick to death of fashion- 
able gayeties, after a month’s undiluted dose of them. 
I had danced my pumps into holes, I knew the menus 
of both the Ritz and the Savoy by heart, and there 
wasn’t a resident on the roads to Ranelagh and Hurl- 
ingham who couldn’t at sight have picked me out of 
a crowd. I had talked my tongue loose with tittle- 
tattle about the infinitely small, and the furnishing of 
inane replies to still more inane questions. The only 
sensible conversation I had taken part in in four long 
weeks had been with the crossing-sweeper opposite St. 
James’ Palace, who had told me how he would solve 
the unemployed problem in five minutes if he was 
given his way. I forget his method, but it struck me 
at the time as salutary. Anyhow, I was ripe for mis- 
chief. 

The address I had obtained from Drummond took 
some finding, and I wandered about for a long time 
in the hot June air, while London basked, and the 
policemen on duty seemed too sleepy to give me any 
information on the subject of my destination. I ran 
the place to earth at last near the British Museum, the 
garden of which looked so tempting that I was within 
an ace of joining the pigeons for a siesta. 

University Mansions was a tall, newly erected 
block of flats, standing back from the main arteries 


JUNE 


163 


of traffic. As I stood in the well of the center court, 
where the glare outside was tempered to a pleasing 
coolness by the stone-flagged floor and staircase, I 
looked up to the dim heights above with a sense of 
mystery. The faint noise of the city created peace 
and remoteness instead of dispelling it. For all the 
signs of life I heard, I might have been the only per- 
son in the building, and, although the entrance opened 
direct on to the street, there was no porter on duty, 
perhaps because it was a cul-de-sac. I could have 
burgled the place or abducted any of its inhabitants 
with impunity. In this spirit, I slowly mounted the 
stairs, listening on each landing with an eavesdropper's 
intentness to catch a sound I could take for company 
on my upward way. A thrill of utter loneliness 
caught at my heart, and nearly drove me to flight be- 
fore I reached the top floor and Number 14. I pressed 
my finger on the electric bell. It tinkled faintly 
within, but no one came. I tried again, with a like 
result. More in despair than from any hope of gain- 
ing an entrance, I turned the handle of the door. I 
had never met a flat door before that opened without 
a latchkey, but, to my astonishment, that one did. 
On the instant I was inside, with the door shut behind 
me. I felt like giving Raffles points for stealth and 
secrecy. _ _ 

For sheer untidiness, commend me to the room I 
found myself in. It was littered with every conceiv- 
able object, from the contents of a wardrobe to the 
remains of a luncheon. Dresses lay over the chairs 
and on the floor, a feather boa dangled from the 
electric standard, soiled white gloves heaped up the 
piano, the table was strewn with dessert and decanters, 
a packing-case poured its contents of straw and shav- 


16 ^ 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


ings on to the hearthrug, and a fallen palm spread its 
length across the sofa. The afternoon sun, filtering 
through Venetian blinds, shed an unnatural light on 
the scene, the greenish pallor it cast over the wreckage 
of dissipation resembling the symptoms that presage 
in the human body the approach of death. The first 
thing I picked out was Massey’s photograph on the 
mantelpiece, a sprig of white heather tacked to the 
frame, and “To Alice, with love from Boy ” sprawl- 
ing across the portrait’s lower limbs, with a compro- 
mising boldness bred of a gust of affection and a new 
“J” nib. I wandered off, examining the varied as- 
sortment of som^nirs and knickknacks that are of 
tribute to a popular actress from the butterflies and 
moths that have been singed in the flame, till I came 
to a standstill before a writing desk piled wrist-deep 
with what I mentally summarized as “ next week’s 
bill of fare.” Sure enough on the top of the heap of 
invitations to picnics, suppers, river parties, and motor 
drives, my eye was caught by the familiar crest of the 
seminary of sound learning in Oxford at which Mas- 
sey was supposed to be acquiring a liberal education. 
I say “supposed,” because his education, so far, had 
been much more in the hands of the young lady in 
whose rooms I stood, than in those of the Fellows and 
Tutors of his College. Elated by my discovery, I sat 
down at the desk — and fell to the floor with a re- 
sounding crash, for the chair, in keeping with its mis- 
tress’s reputation for doing the unexpected, incon- 
tinently gave way beneath my weight. At the same 
moment as I struggled to my feet, by the aid of the 
tablecloth, I saw Alice Howard standing in the door- 
way, whereupon I sank back again into obscurity, in 
company with most of the dessert dishes, a half bottle 


JUNE 


165 


of port, a decanter of sherry, an empty magnum, and 
a cascade of knives and forks. The ruin was com- 
plete. Samson and the pillars of the temple were 
nothing to it. 

“ Well, of all the impudent things !” came the 

lady’s voice, choked with indignation, and cut short 
in the middle of a sentence by her emotion. 

Don’t scream, for heaven’s sake ! ” I said in sepul- 
chral tones from underneath the tablecloth. “ I can 
explain everything,” and I struggled to my feet, this 
time without further damage, there being nothing 
else to break. 

Alice Howard still maintained the same pose, but 
her face had gone crimson. If she had had anything 
in her hand she would have struck me, but, for- 
tunately, she was in no more warlike costume than 
a tea-gown, being fresh roused from a beauty sleep. 
As she made no sign to speak, I began again. 

‘‘ I could get no answer to the bell, so I was pre- 
paring to wait for you, when your inhospitable chair 
broke,” and I held up a long splinter in confirmation. 

‘‘ What business have you coming here at all ? ” 
broke out the lady, with histrionic abruptness. “If 
my maid were here we’d turn you out.” 

“ I’m from the staff of the Jujube,^* I exclaimed, 
with an inspiration of genius, “and I want the story 
of your career, about a column long, anecdotes of your 
professional life, the proposals you have received from 
the peerage, any details of interest to our readers. 
You give me the facts. I’ll put the ‘snap ’ in.” 

Alice Howard looked at me with an expression in 
which rage and surprise fought for the mastery. I 
quailed inwardly, but the one and only principle in 
bluffing ” is to put the other person on the defensive 


166 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


at the outset. I should have been a lost man if I had 
let Miss Howard question niy credentials, or my be- 
havior, so, before she could get a word in, I continued : 

‘H’m extremely sorry if I’ve disturbed you, but I 
thought you were expecting me after my note, so I 
walked in. Really you might have replied, after I’d 
given up a free afternoon to get the interview.” 

My antagonist threw an angry glance in my direc- 
tion, but she made a distinct concession by clearing 
a chair of millinery and sitting down. She wasn’t 
beaten yet, however. 

I shouldn’t think of giving you any information, 
sir, after the impudent way you’ve forced yourself in 
here. If you wish to see me, it must be at the 
theater.” 

‘‘Oh, come now,” I said, with some warmth, for 
the port had spoiled a serviceable pair of trousers, “ I’m 
not a penny-a-liner after a ‘ stick ’ of news to buy my- 
self a drink. I told you I was coming, and here I 
am. I promise you a good show on the magazine 
page of the Saturday Jujube, with an inset quarter- 
column block of yourself, and a double-line heading 
in great primer and pica : 

“Confessions of a Comedienne 

" Miss Alice Howard tells how she Wins all Hearts 

“ You’ll get an increased salary on the strength of 
it, and a year’s credit from your dressmaker to boom 
the firm. I came for a story, and I’m going away 
with one. If you don’t give me the genuine thing, I 
shall write one out on my own — love letters and all — 
and I’ll bring the Court of Chancery down upon you, 
tipstaves, process servers, and the whole gang of 


JUNE 


167 


thieves, by saying that one of its wards wants to elope 
with you!” 

Exhausted by my own eloquence, I pointed to Mas- 
sey’s photograph. 

That was pretty rough on Alice Howard, especially 
after the way I had treated her crockery, but I wasn’t 
going to be turned from my purpose by any one or 
anything. The threat acted like magic, since the 
enemy capitulated, horse, foot and artillery, and I got 
the whole story of Massey’s infatuation from her, 
filling her so with the fear of writs of “Quo War- 
ranto ” and the jargon of Habeas Corpus, mandamus, 
and the rest of it, that I felt positive she would cut 
short her trifling with the infatuated idiot of an under- 
graduate. In her heart of hearts she was bored with 
his affection, and glad to be rid of him. 

But I never let her have a glimpse of my purpose, 
getting the information and conveying the warning 
I wished in the course of my interview. I made what 
amends I could for my conduct by putting all the 
favorite touches into the article — the struggling child- 
hood, the sensational debut, the past sacrifices, the 
future ambitions. I gave copious extracts, some real, 
mot-e mythical, from the “ charming little lady’s ” cor- 
respondence — the Grand Duke and his thirty-six 
quarterings laid at her feet, who had to do his court- 
ship by deputy — an A.D.C. — owing to his ignorance 
of English; the humble admirer in the gallery, who 
saved up his pence for violets, which he sent with a 
note signed “One of the gods, to a goddess”; the 
Johnny in the stalls who came in each night, halfway 
through the second act, to applaud a particular song, 
and who expressed his devotion in the language of 
the Family Herald — “ My heart cries out always ‘ I 


168 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


love thee/ ” and so on for four pages of clotted non- 
sense. It was a handsome reparation, and I left Miss 
Howard beaming. She even went so far as to sug- 
gest that we might meet again. But we shan’t. 

I drove straight round to the Jujube, and, having 
the entree as a regular contributor, got to the editor 
at once. 

‘‘ I’ve a good story for you, sir,” I said, when we 
were alone. “An interview with the coming star of 
the ‘ Firefly ’ — Miss Howard — just the thing to tickle 
up the week-end subscribers. It’s full of spice.” 

“Miss Howard!” remarked the chief, ruminating. 
“ I don’t recall the lady. But I like your stuff, Han- 
bury, and you don’t give us ‘ stumers.’ If Williams 
has room for it, it can go in. Tell him so from me.” 

Williams said he hadn’t room'. But it went in all 
the same, in place of the Women’s Dress Column. 
Women think too much of clothes, and a respectable 
paper like the Jujube oughtn’t to encourage a beset- 
ting weakness of the sex. How many married men 
have been ruined, etc., etc. That was the line of 
reasoning that I took ; that, and an invitation to meet 
Steward at dinner, for Williams is very ambitious in 
the lyric-writing line, and regards Steward as his 
master. 

When I met Williams at the function in question, 
he told me that the inclusion of my interview had led 
to letters of complaint at the consequent omission from 
the Jujube of an article, “ How to make a Directoire 
Gown for half a guinea,” promised in an earlier num- 
ber of the paper. 

Ridiculous ! As though any one can’t make a 
Directoire dress out of two towels and a safety pin. 
Besides, the letter writers ought to have been thankful 


JUNE 


169 


that I had saved them from social ostracism. But 
some people are never grateful. 

Really, I think my family is “the limit.” As 
though the worries of the Season weren’t sufficient to 
drive one nearly wild, without having domestic 
troubles added to them. 

First there’s Dulcie, a dear sweet girl, and a sister 
in a thousand. What must she go and do but fancy 
herself in love with George Burn, one of the best, no 
doubt, but a philanderer if ever there was one, a man 
who can’t help trying to make himself attractive 
where women are concerned, and who has so squan- 
dered his affections in a score of affairs that he is 
incapable of real devotion to a single object. I don’t 
blame George. He has the butterfly temperament, 
and thoroughly enjoys being spoiled by women, who 
have nothing else to spend their time in but flirting 
with the first young man who knows how to behave 
himself with discretion, and whose personal appear- 
ance doesn’t give them away when they meet husbands 
and brothers in Bond Street. When woman is fair, 
man is weak, and he who won’t take the gifts the 
gods provide ” deserves to be exiled to the Bight of 
Benin, or some equally sultry spot where feminine 
society is conspicuous by its absence. 

I must confess to having misjudged Dulcie’s social 
possibilities. My mother’s doubts about the wisdom 
of bringing Dulcie up for the Season are justified. 
My sister is far too ingenuous; too eager to bestow 
her confidence, too unskilled in the world and its 
wicked ways to give herself a fair chance. Only a 
person with an independent income can afford to be 
perfectly natural in London; and as Dulcie, by no 


170 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


stretch of the imagination, can be called an heiress, 
trouble lies before her. She takes compliments seri- 
ously, won't follow the fashion of having her hats 
trimmed with the bodies of birds, and ends by making 
bosom friends — ^because she feels sorry for her — with 
that Renshaw girl, whom every one steers clear of like 
the plague for her faux pas in Cairo. But, as I 
told Dulcie, one feels sorry for lots of people without 
making friends with them — the Prime Minister, for 
instance, and the fellows who work lifts on the Tube. 

Dulcie's first meeting with George in town wasn't a 
success. I happened to be at the Steins' that night, 
and saw it all. George just looked in on his way to 
some more attractive show, for the Steins' set isn't his, 
or mine, for that matter — ^but as my mother had sent 
him a card, he had to put in an appearance and dance 
with Dulcie. The night was very hot, and George 
had a good deal on his mind, what with a “ book " 
for Ascot, a stack of unpaid bills, and several mothers 
getting anxious as to his ‘‘ intentions.” Dulcie, re- 
splendent in a new white frock — she always wears 
white — ^was expecting him to continue their Easter 
romance in the same strain in which they had left it. 
I don't know what George talked about on the balcony 
where the two sat right through the waltz, but he 
probably let his annoyance at having to come to the 
Steins' at all get the better of his manners, and was 
either sulkily silent, or else perfunctorily polite. Any- 
how, when the pair came back Dulcie's blue eyes 
were as big as saucers, her mouth quivered at the 
corners, and she pleaded a headache as excuse for an 
abrupt departure home. 

George and I evaded Mr. Stein's invitation to Sun- 
day lunch which he makes a rule of pressing upon any 


JUNE 


171 


eligible young men who are brought to his wife’s 
dances whether he knows them or not, and went on 
to Brancaster House. George seemed so blissfully 
unaware that his conduct had been taken exception to, 
or that any woman’s charms were to be weighed for 
a moment against those of supper, that I held my 
peace like a tactful brother. 

Next day I had to answ^er a good many questions 
from Dulcie. Was Mr. Burn very popular? What 
did he do with his time? (This was a poser.) Who 
had he danced with afterward? Did I see much of 
him? I did my best for George, since, on the altar 
of my sex, I’d sacrifice truth, or anything else. “ Men 
liked him, women didn’t; he worked hard in the city 
till six, when he had a meat tea and went off to the 
Y. M. C. A. or the Polytechnic; he had danced with 
nobody under forty, save one debutante with a hare- 
lip. I saw as much of him as was good for either of 
us.” I gave George such an exemplary character that 
he was forthwith asked to tea by my literal little sister. 

Constancy, I repeat, is not a strong point with 
George Burn at any time, partly, perhaps, because 
he never gives it a chance. He has “ heard the chimes 
at midnight ” with so many girls, he has squeezed so 
many soft hands in the stalls of so many theaters, and 
whispered sweet nothings in so many ‘‘ shell-likes,” 
that he really can’t remember the distinctive features 
of each. Of course if I were to lay the case for George 
before a woman, she would say, “ Surely, Mr. Burn 
can’t deny that he had a flirtation with IMiss Hanbury 
only six weeks ago ? ” and dismiss my petition on his 
behalf with costs. But in six weeks of the Season one 
can get engaged and break it off, find the ‘‘only 
woman in the world ” and relegate her to the position 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


172 

of ‘‘ last but one,” change from blonde to brunette, 
and back again, with a dash of auburn thrown in. 
The world was made in six days, and the Season can 
be made or marred in six weeks. 

George didnT come to tea, and, worse still, when 
Dulcie met him at Hurlingham on Saturday, he was 
so occupied with Miss Kitty Denver that he took off 
his hat as though by an afterthought. Dulcie sud- 
denly made the discovery that the Season without 
George’s company would be insupportable, and it has 
been the greatest difficulty to persuade her that if 
invitations have been accepted they must be complied 
with. My mother has approached me with I can’t 
see what Dulcie finds in that Mr. Burn. He seems a 
very ordinary young man.” But then I never should 
have expected my mother to be attracted by George. 

I’ve done my best to deal with the situation. Re- 
inforcements in the shape of Haines have been brought 
up, but he had the misfortune on the night he dined 
with us to miss his train from Woking, where he had 
been playing golf, and arrive when the fish was over. 
His feelings never recovered from the shock of cold 
soup, and the bone of the noble salmon which he 
inadvertently swallowed in his haste to “ join the 
field.” 

If Dulcie had any sense she’d let George see she 
didn’t care a hang one way or the other. For a girl 
to sit moping in a corner when a particular man doesn’t 
dance with her, or to follow him up and down the Row 
with her eyes, is to give the show away to him, and 
to everybody else. She ought to make desperate love 
to the most unprepossessing person she can find, so 
that George will jealously try to save her from herself. 
Dulcie will soon gain experience in London. One 


JUNE 


173 


can’t expect the country to implant a knowledge of 
anything except vegetable-marrows and when to plant 
bulbs. 

Dulcie’s affairs aren’t the only domestic problems 
troubling me. My mother insisted that my father 
should grace his only daughter’s debut with his pres- 
ence — and his check-book. So, much against his 
will, he is up in town doing the Season, a thing he 
hasn’t done for thirty years. Not that it involves him 
in much social hardship, except that he can’t walk 
about with a spud, or smoke black twist in the “ Way- 
farers’ Club.” His arrival, by the way, in the latter 
place for the first time in half a dozen years created 
quite a sensation, for the porters imagined he was an 
unauthorized stranger trying to force his way into 
that exclusive institution. The situation was compli- 
cated by my father thinking it beneath his dignity to 
give his name to ‘‘ the menials ” on the ground that it 
was their business to know the members. If old Lord 
Dingwall hadn’t happened to come out and salute the 
governor warmly, things might have become still more 
awkward. 

Being on the spot, my father, naturally, has devoted 
a good deal of attention to me, and rarely a day has 
passed but I have received a visit from him, and an 
exposition of his views on the responsibilities attach- 
ing to the position of only son of a landed proprietor, 
and master of harriers. With his ingrained habit of 
avoiding controversy, he has talked in general terms, 
and with no definite personal application, until one 
morning at the beginning of the month, I was in my 
rooms putting the finishing touches to an article, com- 
missioned by the Whirlwind, entitled, “If Pontius 
Pilate came to Peckham,” when my parent walked in. 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


1T4j 

I excused myself doing more, for the moment, than 
greeting him, and left him to wander round the room 
at his leisure. While I summed up the Procurator’s 
opinion of the salubrious suburb in a few trenchant 
sentences, I heard my father turn over the things on 
the table, finger ‘‘the picture gallery and jumble sale 
combined ” that constituted the contents of the man- 
telpiece, and take his bearings from all points of the 
compass. 

“ What allowance do you get, Gerald ? ” he sud- 
denly exclaimed. 

I turned around in my chair, to see him holding a 
collection of manuscripts between his finger and 
thumb. 

“ Five hundred pounds, sir,” I replied. My father 
always likes the old-fashioned mode of address be- 
tween father and son. 

“Look here, Pll make it eight hundred if you’ll 
chuck all this,” and he proceeded to drop the offend- 
ing bundle to the floor. “ This writing business is not 
much of a trade at any time. For a son of mine it’s 
sheer nonsense.” 

“ It’s awfully good of you to make the offer, sir.” — 
It was, for the estate hasn’t been doing well for years. 
— “ But I couldn’t lounge about at home.” 

“ There’s plenty of work to be done, Gerald,” re- 
plied my father, shredding some black tobacco into 
his pipe. “ Lots to do in maintaining the traditions 
of our family in the country, and performing your 
duty as a magistrate, and landowner. Lots to do, 
lots to do,” and he continued to mutter it for some 
seconds. 

“ When the times comes,” I said, “ I’ll do my best ; 
but until then, and may it be many years off yet, I 


JUNE 


175 


can’t throw up what I feel I can succeed in. What do 
you particularly object to, sir, in the profession of 
literature ? ” 

“ The loss of self-respect,” replied my father fiercely. 
‘‘ Look at the papers. They’re ruining England, and 
the fellows who write for them must be fools or 
knaves, or both.” 

'‘But I don’t write for the papers, or only very 
occasionally,” I said, to appease his wrath. “ The 
briefs don’t come, and London without a definite job 
of some kind is impossible.” 

“Ah, that’s a point I want to discuss with you, 
Gerald,” my father exclaimed, pulling at his pipe in a 
manner that betrayed his excitement. “ Your mother 
and I wonder what keeps you in town so much, when 
there’s as much sport as you could wish for at home. 
I hope, my boy, there’s no woman in the case. I 
don’t like to inquire too closely into your personal 
affairs, but,” and he turned to the specimens of Eng- 
lish beauty on the mantelpiece — “ there’s enough here 
to turn any man’s head. Now, this young lady! 
Might I ask who she is?” And my father took up 
the latest photograph of Cynthia Cochrane. It was 
one of my days “ off ” in the way of luck. 

“ That? ” I said carelessly. “ That’s an ' out of the 
past, I come to thee,’ as the poem says.” 

My father gave a grim smile. 

“ The poem may say what it likes, but the date on 
this is only a month old. Don’t let a taste for this 
sort of thing destroy your inclinations for orthodox 
matrimony. I shall never forget poor Boothby tell- 
ing me, one night at the club more than twenty years 
ago, that the romance that runs wild is the worst 
preparation for the one that has to go in bit and 


176 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


bridle. I understood the point better when, three days 
later, I learned that Boothby had left his wife, and gone 
to Buenos Ayres with a previous attachment.” 

“ ril play the game, sir, never fear, when I go in 
to bat,” I made reply ; “ but at present Tm in the 
pavilion looking on.” 

‘‘Don’t get out in the first over, like Boothby,” 
said my father, with a humor evidently caught from 
the infectious gayety of London in June. “ Remember, 
you’ve got to carry on the name of Hanbury to the 
next generation. Never link it to any incident which 
could bring discredit on it.” 

So saying, he knocked the ashes from his pipe and 
departed, leaving me with a feeling uncommonly like 
remorse that I wasn’t cast in a mold to, delight his 
family instincts in a more direct fashion. Why is 
Providence so perverse? Ten to one a son of mine 
will care for nothing but riding to hounds. 

I always pity the people who fancy they are doing 
the smart thing at Royal Ascot when they rush down 
from town in a motor twice as big as the Albert Hall, 
make an elaborate toilet, surrounded by bandboxes 
and dressing cases, outside the gates of the Grand 
Stand, fly feverishly round the Paddock between each 
race, skip on and off coaches, try every club tent in 
turn to see which has the best strawberries, and pose 
below the royal box in the hopes of achieving immor- 
tality on the illustrated page of the Daily Looking- 
Glass. 

No, the sensible person travels <iown quietly in a 
“ special,” ensconcing himself upon arrival on the roof 
of the Enclosure, where he gets shade, and a view of 
the course uninterrupted by mountains of feathers, 


JUNE 


:i7T 

and from which he can look down in comfort on the 
living whirlpool at his feet. As he begins lunch just 
before the last race, he takes no part in the game of 
grab over the lobster salad and the truffled chicken, 
and he sees the champagne poured over somebody 
else; he smokes his cigar in peace and is alert to 
commandeer the prettiest girl to share his aerie, 
while a rival admirer is lying helpless from indiges- 
tion and incipient sunstroke, with a lump of ice on 
his head. 

It was in the latter spirit that I stage-managed a 
party, consisting of Dulcie, Aliss Maitland, and 
Archie Haines to Ascot on Cup Day. Haines had 
been persuaded by me to give the “ bulls and 
‘‘ bears ” a rest, in order to reward my sister for giv- 
ing me an opportunity of removing the bad impres- 
sion I had left with Audrey Maitland at the Bratons’ 
ball, and my gratitude further showed itself in my 
self-restraint when Dulcie nearly caused us to lose the 
train at Waterloo by taking an unconscionable time 
over her coiffure. 

My course of action with Miss Maitland had been 
decided on beforehand. I would show the girl the 
true repentance I felt for my previous outburst by 
maintaining a dignified reserve. Then, when her 
feminine intuition had led her to put the right con- 
struction on my silence, and to convey to me, as 
woman so subtly can, that the past had been forgotten, 
and forgiven, I would resume my real, unfettered self, 
win her admiration by the brilliance of my conversa- 
tion, let her see that sentiment and its pitfalls were 
not for me, perhaps even make her regret that, in 
obedience to the vague dictates of an abstract mentor 
called maidenly modesty, she had spurned such a 


ITS 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


precious possession as my friendship might have be- 
come. So it -was planned. Events, however, fell out 
quite differently. The dignified reserve was mistaken 
for sulkiness, and Miss Maitland gave her undivided 
attention to Haines, who, flattered by the interest his 
remarks aroused, surpassed himself as a raconteur, 
and an amusing, if cynical, critic of the follies of the 
|day. Of any man but Haines I should have felt con- 
foundedly jealous, but Archie has all the instincts of 
a monk, though his profession of stockbrokering pro- 
vides him with few opportunities for indulging his 
peculiar tastes. In his scheme of things women are 
less than nothing. I wish I thought the same. 

Baffled, I tried another tack, and began to compete 
with Haines on his own ground, crowning my wit 
with the aphorism, modeled on the best masters, that 
‘Hhe comedies of this world are the tragedies of the 
next.” But this epigrammatic effort was regarded as 
irreverent by Miss Audrey Maitland, who takes a 
Sunday-school class when at home, and is on terms of 
intimacy with a leading official of the Clergy Susten- 
tation Fund. Fortunately we arrived at our destina- 
tion before my wounded vanity could precipitate a 
catastrophe. 

As we walked from the station along the private 
way reserved for the holders of Enclosure vouchers, 
I seized my courage in both hands to inquire of Miss 
Maitland whether I was forgiven. 

** What for ? ” the girl asked. 

‘‘ Why, for my folly when we last met.” 

“When was that? I have forgotten all about it.” 

So, I had created such a slight impression on Miss 
Audrey Maitland that I was classed with the horde of 
casual partners of a season, my identity obliterated 


JUNE 


179 


by the next infernal idiot to be introduced, in order 
that he might chatter nonsense to a girl a thousand 
times too good for him. I could have torn my 
voucher into fragments in that bitter moment, and re- 
turned to town. Much Miss Maitland would have 
cared ! 

'‘At the Bratons^” I replied, as calmly as I could 
under the knockdown blow my companion’s indiffer- 
ence had dealt me. 

"Oh, of course,” Miss Maitland had the grace to 
smile. "You were rather foolish, but then you are 
just like the others — always saying things you don’t 
mean.” 

"To girls who don’t care,” I added quickly. 

" How strange you are, Mr. Hanbury ! Why 
should the girl be serious when the man isn’t? No- 
body would be more annoyed than your philanderer 
at finding himself confronted with real romance, when 
all he wanted was a tinsel flirtation.” 

Here was a foeman worthy of my steel, in all con- 
science. Cup Day promised to be something more 
than a mere fashionable outing. 

" Yes,” I retorted, " but one must begin somehow, 
and flirtations, as often as not, end in engagements.” 

" And how many hearts,” said the girl, " are not 
broken, waiting for that transformation to take place ? 
For her own sake the woman must not wear her heart 
on her sleeve.” 

" The fashion would be more becoming,” I re- 
marked, " than the hideous bows people wear at pres- 
ent.” 

We were crossing the highroad to the Grand 
Stand, and if we outraged conventions at Ascot by 
seeming too serious we were liable to be refused ad- 


180 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


mittance. The stewards of the Jockey Club can be 
very strict on occasions. 

Miss Maitland drew aside to let me pay the entrance 
money, a masculine privilege I could easily forgo. 

“ Thank you, Mr. Hanbury,’’ she murmured, so that 
Dulcie should not hear. “ You administered the coup 
de grace very neatly, and almost painlessly. I am 
grateful.” 

But there was a gleam of mischief in the girl’s eyes 
that spoke less of gratitude than revenge. Well, I 
should not decline a further encounter, but it couldn’t 
take place just yet, for we were fairly in the current of 
smart humanity pouring through the subway that 
leads to the paddock. 

The Royal Meeting is not the time for a man to 
engage in gloomy speculation as to the place he holds 
in the estimation of the girl who is beginning to 
usurp the place of honor in his affections. Haines 
and I, having obtained the usual ‘‘ good things ” in 
the way of tips, were anxious to back our fancy with- 
out delay, but our fair companions had no thoughts 
beyond which of the friends whom they had seen 
only yesterday they should meet again, as though the 
surroundings of the Enclosure had some magical 
property in conferring on people virtues and graces 
which they conspicuously lacked in London itself. 
Anyhow, whether it was the presence of Royalty, 
floating like an impalpable essence in the air, or a 
sense of being dressed to the best advantage, Dulcie 
and Audrey Maitland insisted on dragging us at their 
heels, while they fairly reveled in their surroundings. 
If Haines and I had had parasols and open-work 
necks to our shirts we 'might have, too, but, con- 
demned to the outrageous clothes that fashion decrees 


JUNE 


181 


for our sex, we cursed and perspired, mere driftwood 
on the tide of pleasure. Dulcie is both curious and 
observant, and this combination of qualities kept us 
busy. She wanted to know why Mrs. Ffolliot was 
nes^er seen with her husband, what gave Arthur Ham- 
mond the scar on his cheek, why the Bolton girls wore 
such dreadful sashes, and who rumor said was en- 
gaged to little Lord Dawlish. 

For half an hour the comedy of social intercourse 
was played to a crowded house. We shook hands with 
people whom we couldn’t stand the sight of, because 
their income ran into five figures, or their cook was a 
Parisian: we showered small talk on the dull and the 
witty alike; and made no distinction of compliments 
to the old or the young, the fair or the plain. Our 
unanimity and lack of discrimination were wonderful. 
The effervescence of badinage and repartee, frothy 
and heady, foamed over one and all. Light glances 
shot from eye to eye. The frou-frou ” of frill and 
flounce gave even the most distant handshake the 
semblance of a caress, imparted to the most trivial 
remark the spice of an epigram. Dulcie told every 
girl how sweet her dress looked, while Haines — and 
I, so far as I could without compromising myself in 
the eyes of Audrey Maitland — conveyed with unmis- 
takable directness of gaze that we thought the wearer 
sweeter still. The grateful looks we received in re- 
turn would have turned our heads had we not been 
seasoned — five seasons, to be exact. 

Luncheon in our club tent introduced us to the 
‘‘ old gang” — Faith Bellew with her fiance the Major, 
whom she would persist in addressing as ‘‘Joe”; 
Lady Susan Thurston with Dolly, the latter, from the 
warmth of her manner to me, evidently enjoying the 


18 ^ 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


fruits of my success in pricking the bubble of Clive 
Massey’s stage-door romance; George Burn, “on his 
own,” his presence endured by Dulcie with an expres- 
sion of indifference which gave the utmost credit to 
her self-control, and explained by himself as due to 
the fact that, with the thermometer at eighty degrees 
in the shade, he couldn’t have touched a morsel if he 
had had to face the crimson lake of Mrs. Denver’s 
complexion during the meal in the box to which, at 
Kitty Denver’s instigation, he had been invited. At 
any other time I should have been glad to welcome so 
many of those for whom I entertain the warmest 
regard. I was, however, gracing Cup Day with my 
presence, not to hear George’s views on the starting 
gate, or Lady Susan’s recipe for mayonnaise sauce, 
but to see as much of Audrey Maitland as I could. 
Short of actual rudeness, I did my best to discourage 
inroads on my monopoly of the girl’s company, not 
only in the tent, but outside in the Enclosure where 
the social sheep were separated from the goats, and 
the people who talked in shrill tones about “two to 
one, bar one ” and “ the dear Queen ” were limited, by 
an iron paling and a detachment of the Metropolitan 
police, to gazing on the object of their familiar ad- 
miration. My sister and Haines, however, resisted 
every effort at dislodgment. It was not till past four 
o’clock that, as we were filing through the turnstile 
leading to the paddock, I had occasion to address a 
word to a passing acquaintance, and delay Audrey 
Maitland for a moment of time sufficient to let the 
others vanish from our view. 

“ Quick,” said Miss Maitland, “ before we miss 
them!” 

I took in the situation in a flash. 


JUNE 


183 


There they go,” I exclaimed, with deceitful readi- 
ness, and we hastened toward the subway, a route I 
had selected as best qualified to lift the yoke of an 
unnatural chaperonage from my galled shoulders. 

“ Why, they’re going to the station ! ” I said, when 
we emerged by the entrance gates behind the Grand 
Stand. ‘‘ They must have concluded we should 
follow.” 

“ Are you certain ? ” asked Miss Maitland, with a 
lack of the implicit confidence a woman should repose 
in a man. 

‘‘ Abso-bally-lutely ! I could tell Dulcie’s hat any- 
where, and there’s old Haines slouching along beside 
her ! ” 

Before this mythical accuracy of vision my com- 
panion’s doubts vanished, and without more ado we 
proceeded to the station where — the gods be praised — 
a train was standing by the London platform. 

Let’s jump in here,” I said hurriedly, at the door 
of the first carriage, which contained empty places. 
“ The others will have got in farther down.” 

‘‘Oh, but I must find Dulcie.” Audrey Maitland 
spoke in distress. 

“You’ll be as right as rain. Hurry up; the guard 
is waving his flag.” 

Miss Maitland sprang into the carriage ; I followed. 
A pause ensued, during which nothing particular hap- 
pened save that the train remained stationary. 

“ Hasn’t the engine driver seen the guard’s sig- 
nal? ” The question came from the girl. 

“He can’t have,” I replied cheerfully. Had I not 
won all along the line? 

“Are you quite sure the guard was waving his 
flag?” 


184 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Miss Maitland's persistence over a trivial detail 
annoyed me. I made a slip of the tongue. 

“I expect so." 

“ Expect ? " Audrey Maitland repeated the word 
in a puzzled tone, then she looked at me. “ But you 
must have seen him do it. Or were you inventing? 
And if about the guard, why not about the others? 
Mr. Hanbury, did you really see your sister?" 

“ Inventing ? " I could do no better than that. 

The truth in all its naked hideousness burst upon 
my inquisitor. She got up to leave the carriage. At 
that moment the train started, after doing all the mis- 
chief it could by its dilatoriness. Miss Maitland re- 
sumed her seat with more speed than dignity. When 
she had recovered her composure, she began again. 

‘‘ What colored hat was your sister wearing?" 

Miss Maitland was going to make certain of my 
guilt before she sentenced me. I couldn't for the life 
of me recall the niceties of Dulcie's costume, in spite 
of the fact that her unpunctuality in the morning 
should have impressed them on my masculine mem- 
ory. 

“ Blue,” I replied. “ No, I mean pink." 

I see that men " — what withering scorn Audrey 
Maitland put into her voice — ‘‘ will stoop to anything 
to get their way. I know now, Mr. Hanbury, how 
much I can trust you in future." 

‘‘ Aren't you breaking a butterfly on the wheel ? ” I 
asked. ‘‘ I only practiced a harmless little decep- 
tion." 

But to the stern judge of two-and-twenty my con- 
duct seemed neither harmless nor petty. So for the 
rest of the journey I was treated as too despicable to 
be spoken to. I managed to mitigate my punishment 


JUNE 


185 


by staring at Audrey Maitland. A man in the dock 
is justified in behaving like a criminal. 

“ Thank you for a most enjoyable hour,” I said, as 
we disembarked at Waterloo. ‘‘I didn’t know any 
woman could hold her tongue for an hour.” 

** Don’t show yourself rude as well as untruthful,” 
retorted Miss Maitland. 

“Don’t lose your temper as well as your sense of 
humor,” I replied, and we parted. 

Browbeat a woman and she learns to love you ; give 
in to her and she despises you. That has been my 
experience. Although facts seem against me so far, 
I don’t believe Miss Audrey Maitland is going to 
falsify it. 




> • 


> 

I 



t 


I ' 


* 


• ^ 

I 


I 


« 



JULY 


Jenny kissed me when we met, 

Jumping from the chair she sat in; 

Time, you thief! who love to get 
Sweets into your list, put that in. 

Say Tm weary, say I’m sod, 

Say that health and wealth have missed me. 
Say I’m growing old, but add, 

Jenny kissed me. 


Leigh Hunt. 








JULY 

A Festival in Bohemia — Lords and Ladies — The 
Major married — A Scene behind the Scenes 

T T seems altogether wrong that a woman should be 
able so to affect a man's moods as to drive him 
from his customary social haunts to hide his wounded 
feelings behind a veil of Bohemianism. Yet that is 
what Miss Audrey Maitland has done for Gerald 
Hanbury, by maintaining an attitude of frigid hauteur 
on the occasions when she has met him since the affair 
at Royal Ascot. Accordingly, to mark his sense of 
the girl's injustice he has avoided the Park, refused all 
the offers of hospitality which are the birthright of the 
bachelor, put his dress clothes into lavender, and once 
again sought the company of Frank Steward, the 
journalist. 

Since I last saw him, some two months ago, Steward 
has been promoted to the assistant editor's chair of 
the Evening Star, where, from eight-thirty in the 
morning to six in the evening, he keeps the staff at 
high pressure, two messengers on the run, and a 
hello " girl earning every penny of her salary in the 
telephone exchange. And, as if his professional duties 
in Fleet Street were not sufficient, my friend has been 
hard at work for Mason of the “ Alcazar," making 
such alterations in the leading lady's part of the 
musical comedy. The Bird in the Bush, as will fit it 
for Cynthia Cochrane, the change of cast involving 
the writing of several new songs, including a topical 
ditty, ‘‘That's how Cleopatra got the Needle." 

But, in spite of the load of responsibilities he bear^ 

189 


190 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


as a consequence of his growing reputation, Steward 
contrives to fulfill all manner of engagements, and 
with especial zest when I appear on the scene, for he 
holds the theory, very flattering to my own self-esteem, 
that my temperament, impulsive, yet critical, intent on 
sucking every drop of juice from the orange the while 
it subjects the fruit to the closest analysis, heightens 
his sense of enjoyment. As for myself, I know that 
Society appears dust and ashes to me when in Stew- 
ard’s company. I breathe the oxygen of heaven, not 
the carbonic acid gas of earth. I am no longer a pup- 
pet dancing to strings controlled by feminine Angers, 
but a man filled with the wonder of life, and the 
strength to seize the magic thing ere it passes — ^with 
youth — forever. 

To have one’s name inscribed on the roll of Stew- 
ard’s friendship is a privilege that opens the doors of 
many Enchanted Gardens from which the majority of 
mankind is rigidly excluded. Thus it was with him 
that I went to the Boo j urn’s Club, hidden away in 
mean streets, of which the members’ list and the 
visitors’ book between them contained every name 
famous for generations in all walks of life. I looked 
on masters of their craft at play till my head whirled 
with conflicting emotions, and Steward loomed before 
me as miraculous a guide as Mephistopheles did to 
Faust when the fiend showed the astonished doctor 
the kingdoms of the world. A halo was cast over 
that night’s proceedings by the punch, the mellow 
flavor of which proved an instant anodyne for care. 
One buried one’s face in the bowl, and withdrew, heed- 
less of sorrow, and little wonder, for the fragrance of 
the draught had soothed the researches of Gibbon, 
and checked the garrulous folly of Goldsmith. 


JULY 


191 


When we have not been feasting with those pagan 
gods, who, despite the assertions of orthodoxy, still 
linger in our midst. Steward and I have spent hours 
in discovering the queer haunts that lie just off the 
well-trodden thoroughfares, surveying the monuments 
of the past, disturbing memories hidden under the 
dust of other days. Having the traditions of London 
stored in his memory, the journalist can tell the his- 
tory of any building, and of the men who have played 
a part in it, thus enriching the wanderings during 
which we have explored the Savoy and the Temple, 
mingled with the strange coteries of Bloomsbury and 
Wardour Street, and generally contrived to squeeze a 
quart of sensation into a pint pot of incident. On such 
occasions his conversation, based on wide views and 
cosmopolitan sympathies, makes Steward an ideal 
companion. Tout comprendre, c'est tout pardon- 
iierT He has seen men and women of every class and 
nationality. Understanding them, he has found some- 
thing lovable in each. 

But, unlike so many, my Fleet Street friend’s 
humanity does not weaken his courage and resource. 
To my mind, he gave conspicuous proof of these 
qualities only two nights ago, when we were both 
present at the fete given by the proprietor of Jose’s 
Hotel and Restaurant to his patrons in celebration of 
the twenty-fifth anniversary of his wedding to Madame 
Jose, the comely lady who superintends the comforts 
of the customers, checks the bills, and receipts them 
at one and the same time as she scolds the waiters and 
shrieks shrill orders in Castilian down the kitchen lift, 
making the long room with the gilt mirrors as redo- 
lent of her vigorous self, as it already is of garlic and 
red pepper. For years Steward has taken his Satur- 


192 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


day night dinner there, because he likes to rub 
shoulders with the mixed clientele of the place, and for 
the sake of a certain savory dish of fowl cooked with 
rice, cockscombs and truffles, a liking for which 
he acquired during a visit to Madrid as a special 
correspondent. 

Being in his flat when the invitation to the fete in 
question arrived, I was included in Steward’s accept- 
ance, for, as he said to me, “ Old Jose can’t do without 
the little paragraphs I slip in for him when news is 
slack, and the ‘ form ’ wants filling up.” 

In our oldest clothes. Steward and I turned up 
almost as ill-favored scallywags as the rest of the 
company. And they were a crew! Flowing black 
ties as big as napkins, hair as long as lions’ manes, 
scarf pins that looked like stair rods, and ear orna- 
ments the size of curtain rings ! One bearded fellow 
sat in his frilled shirt sleeves, with a colored sash at 
the waist to keep him together, while a personage, 
pointed out as the conductor of a restaurant orchestra 
taking a night off, might have been mistaken for a 
hussar in his braided uniform of scarlet and blue. 
The few attempts at orthodox evening dress were not 
very successful — a, would-be epicure, with no white 
shirt in his wardrobe, had substituted a flannel one 
which needed washing; another, proud in the posses- 
sion of the required article, had marred the effect by 
writing across its starched surface in black chalk, 

Felicidades ” — that is to say, ‘‘ All manner of happi- 
ness.” The ladies were no whit behind the gentlemen 
in eccentricity of appearance. Scarfs over the head, 
long gloves, dresses low and high, from brocade to 
cotton, a profusion of beads and jet, gold crucifixes 
and bronze necklets — such were the feminine fashion^ 


JULY 


193 


which thronged Jose’s restaurant at 7 p. m. on Tues- 
day. 

The banquet to which Signor Jose’s guests sat 
down in any order they pleased, was a procession of 
dishes which I failed to identify by the Italian of the 
menu, but which consisted, to my palate, of chicken, 
served as risotto, pilaff, and in other outlandish dis- 
guises, but still chicken. We ate the bones in the 
soup, the breast was minced and hashed, the legs 
appeared decked with little frills, and surrounded by a 
bodyguard of preserved cherries, until finally the car- 
case, in the language of Mrs. Beeton, was garnished 
with greens and served hot.” I was consumed with 
curiosity (like the first oyster) as to what further out- 
rage could be inflicted on the domestic fowl by the 
wizards below, when the courses made a sudden 
plunge into the sweets; the quaint assemblage, ab- 
sorbed hitherto in the solids, burst out into a polyglot 
uproar that created the same cacophony of sound as 
the Small Cats’ House at the Zoo, and my right-hand 
neighbor, a buxom lady with strongly marked 
Southern features, began to ply me with questions as 
to Vot you call dis een Inglesa? ” much as if I were 
a pupil of the Berlitz System. I parried her linguistic 
problems as best I could, till Steward, providentially 
seated on my other side, drew my attention to the 
bearded person in shirt sleeves, who, having excited, 
by his appetite, the voracious rivalry of another pictur- 
esque swashbuckler, was engaged in a duel over the 
syllabub for his country’s honor. 

‘‘ You’ll see some funny sights before dawn,” whis- 
pered Steward to me. 

‘‘ It’ll be difflcult to see anything at all,” I replied, 
‘‘if they smoke much of the stuff they’ve begun on,” 


194 - 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


for the clouds in process of issuing from the mouths 
and nostrils of both men and women were of so dense 
and pungent a nature that a smoke helmet would have 
been a boon. An Englishman could have equally well 
dispensed with the toasts, sounding to uninstructed 
ears like ‘‘ Grazia Sancho Panza Maceroni Dan 
Leno,” although the strange audience clashed glasses 
and stamped the floor in perfect comprehension of the 
meaning. This ritual over, the guests combined their 
efforts to clear away the debris of the meal with a 
readiness that surprised Steward and myself, till, upon 
the bare boards being covered with green cloths, the 
paraphernalia of faro ’’ were produced as if by magic, 
and the mystery explained. The real business of the 
night was about to be entered on, and the respectable 
surroundings of a restaurant turned into an excel- 
lent imitation of a Neapolitan gambling resort. Jose’s 
protest in the interest of his license was speedily over- 
borne, and he himself soon as flushed with the fever 
of the play as his patrons. As I stood in the back- 
ground, the scene illumined by guttering candles, 
which had replaced the electric light from considera- 
tions of safety and the police, watching the fierce, dark 
faces which mirrored the passions evoked by the 
hazard of the game, I felt myself anywhere on earth 
rather than within a hundred yards of Piccadilly 
Circus, and when Southern blood precipitated the 
inevitable crisis, I acted my part with the utmost 
sang-froid. 

Some one’s stake was in dispute ; every one in the 
vicinity, croupiers included, interfered at first with 
conflicting opinions, next with abuse, a blow was 
struck, and a sudden lurch of the disputants, by this 
time locked in personal conflict, upset a portion of the 


JULY 


195 


table, and with it Shirt Sleeves ” and the winnings he 
was engaged in counting. In a second he was on his 
feet, scowling and ominous. Before a hand could be 
raised to stop him, he had plunged a short knife into 
the shoulder of the nearest bystander, and stampeded 
through the frightened crowd to the upper regions. 

At that moment of stress, when the air was harsh 
with the weeping of hysterical women, and the cries 
of threatening men, one individual alone rose to the 
height of action — Steward. 

‘‘ Hi, Jose,'' he yelled, ‘‘ clear the women out, and 
for God's sake straighten up this mess before the 
police get wind of it ! Some one " — he went on, clear- 
ing a circle round the victim, who was squawking on 
the ground — ‘‘some one bind up this chap's shoulder. 
It's only a flesh wound. The rest come along after 
me. 

And seizing a poker from the grate, my friend 
dashed toward the stairs. 

Then for the gallant band, who followed Steward's 
leadership, and in the ranks of which I found myself 
next to the conductor, the splendors of his uniform 
dimmed by the vicissitudes of the evening, there 
ensued a wild hue and cry, in the course of which we 
ransacked cupboards, linen chests, and boxes, ex- 
plored the mysteries of Madame’s wardrobe, and 
gleaned much knowledge of the domestic economy of 
the Hotel Jose. Beds were belabored, corners probed 
with the emergency weapons we had provided our- 
selves with, and any and every place searched where 
a man might lurk. Not till the attics were reached 
did a locked door give promise of our quarry. To 
Steward's hoarse command to open, the only reply was 
a scraping noise suggestive of a chest of drawers being 


196 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


dragged into position. The barrier was ineffectual, 
for before our united strength the whole structure gave 
way, and in the wreckage, revealed by the candle of 
the besieging force, stood the figure of the culprit, 
threatening us with his open knife. 

Steward never hesitated an instant, although phy- 
sically no match for his opponent. Dashing in, he 
dodged the other’s thrust, and dealt a crashing blow 
with his poker right across the forehead of the 
foreigner. ‘‘ Shirt Sleeves ” fell like a log. 

“ Drag him out,” said Steward, as coolly as though 
nothing unusual had happened. ‘‘ He’ll have a head- 
ache that will make him feel sick for a week, and a 
scar to carry to his grave. That’s better than putting 
him in the dock, and getting this place shut up as a 
gambling den.” 

So saying, he threw his poker away and descended 
the stairs. 

When we got below the restaurant was orderly once 
more, not a sign of baize or counters to be seen, and 
the wounded man removed to a hospital where no 
questions would be asked. As for “ Shirt Sleeves,” he 
was packed off in a cab with two compatriots, still 
half-stunned by his blow, which would serve to remind 
him, far better than a term of imprisonment, of the 
disadvantages of acting in England in the free and 
easy way he was accustomed to in Naples, or which- 
ever city had had the misfortune to produce him. 

Steward’s only comment on the proceedings, made 
as we strolled away across Leicester Square, was char- 
acteristic : 

‘‘ When next I dine with a gentleman in his shirt 
sleeves, I shoot at sight.” 

The incident has left me with the impression that 


JULY 


197 


perhaps the charms of Bohemia have been overstated. 
My unconventionality stops short of knives. 

My father at last justified his forty years' member- 
ship of the M. C. C. by securing a carriage ticket for 
the Eton and Harrow match at Lord's this year, the 
position allotted being just opposite the Grand Stand, 
in the critical spot for seeing the promenade and the 
play. So we hired a sort of coach and wagonette 
arrangement, and asked everybody who had shoot- 
ing or fishing to give away to come to it. At least 
that was the idea, but it resolved itself into my people 
retiring into the covered seats of Block A away from 
the glare and the crowd, Dulcie and myself being left 
to do the honors. Dulcie's social sense, as I have 
said before, is not acute, and she preferred to watch 
the game from the inside seat. I was satisfied with 
buying a “ card of the match, c'rect card," at the fall 
of each wicket, and hailing my acquaintances as they 
struggled by, for between the hours of three and six 
on the Friday of the Eton and Harrow, all Society is 
to be met with at St. John's Wood, provided the 
weather conditions be propitious. This year they 
were the hottest in living memory. The pitch of the 
pathway bubbled, the seams of the woodwork gaped, 
one could have cooked eggs on the brickwork of the 
Pavilion, and the free seats were a bank of sunshades 
and panamas. The tropical heat didn't worry me, for 
I had an iced drink tucked away under the seat, an 
awning over my head, nothing to do but return the 
bows of parboiled partners and their mammas, and 
give languid attention to George Burn, who, having 
made the discovery that the Hanbury carriage offered 
the best point of vantage to which he had access, had 


198 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


become a fixture by my side. I could have endured 
this cool imposition better had George been in his 
ordinary careless mood, but on this occasion he had 
a tale of woe to relate. Apparently both Lady Lucy 
Goring and Kitty Denver were under the impression 
my erratic friend had proposed to them, and he was 
at a loss how to remove the misapprehension from 
their minds. George had conveyed to each that he 
cared for her, while omitting to mention how many 
others shared those same elastic affections of his. 

“What happens when you meet them at the same 
ball ? I asked, after every available fa-ct had been 
retailed to my patient ears. “You must lead a Box 
and Cox life keeping them apart.” 

“Don’t laugh at me, Hanbury, there’s a good fel- 
low ! ” said George, making a wry face. “ Fm in an 
awful hole. The worst is, I find it so fatally easy to 
get into the good graces of the sex, that, before I know 
what I’m doing. I’m calling a girl by her Christian 
name, and asking her to a radium party at the club.” 

“ I can’t offer you any help,” I made reply, “ except 
to lend you enough to clear out of the country till the 
scandal has blown over.” 

George’s expression changed. 

“ By Jove, talking of scandal, Hanbury, that little 
Ponting-Mallow woman is going the pace, from all 
accounts.” 

“Who’s the fellow?” I asked eagerly. After all, 
it’s never too hot to talk scandal. 

“ He’s a soldier-man on leave from India — mus- 
tache curling to the back of his head — hat stuck over 
one ear — bronzed son of Mars — knows his world like 
a book.” 

“ Yes, a betting-book. I’ve met the type.” 

“ Well, Mrs. P.-M. was introduced to the hero at a 


JULY 


199 


reception of the Society for the Suffocation of Social- 
ists. She^s married to a man old enough to be her 
father; Rowan — that’s the gallant captain — a fine 
figure of a man to a woman who is unhappy at home, 
is kicking his heels in London on nine months’ leave, 
knowing nobody except the hall porter of his club 
and the cloakroom attendants at the music halls ; Mrs. 
Mallow is a clinging little person; the captain doesn’t 
object to be clung to. But the fellow ought to know 
better than to run the gauntlet of Boulter’s Lock with 
her on two Sundays running, and give her supper at 
the Continental. There you are, mon ami!^^ 

‘‘ Talk of the devil ” said I at this moment, and 

we both stopped our conversation to watch the offend- 
ing couple pass. 

Rowan was a handsome enough man in a bounder- 
ish way, but he had a recklessness of gait, and an 
effeminacy of dress that augured ill for his chivalry 
and devotion when his vanity was sated, or his sense 
of danger aroused. His companion, fluffy and petite, 
had a vivacity and radiance of expression, bred of 
sheer happiness at being with her soldier, that empha- 
sized, by contrast, the discontented spirit she showed 
in her own home. I raised my hat to Mrs. Ponting- 
Mallow in my most impresse manner. It was none 
of my business to cast the first stone, and she would 
probably need all our sympathy and charity in the near 
future. 

Just then Massey and Dolly Thurston hove into 
sight, and came to a halt below our aerie. I had not 
seen the former since the good work I had accom- 
plished on his behalf in Alice Howard’s flat, but he 
bore me no malice over the closing down of his 
chorus-girl romance, unless any such feeling could be 
read into his remark — ‘‘ Been doing any more inter- 


^00 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


fering lately, Hanbury?^^ which he made while Dolly 
was occupied with George. 

“You can drive tandem again as soon as you like,’* 
I retorted on Massey, with an indifferent air, for, to 
tell the truth, the love affairs of babes and sucklings 
don’t interest me. One sees too much of such things 
in the Season to get excited over them. 

I let Dulcie take the pair away for lemonade and 
chocolate eclairs, and returned to George and his 
scandal-mongering tongue. 

“There’s that Miss Maitland who was spending 
Easter with you,” he said, as I again joined him aloft. 

I searched the crowd with eager eyes, to see Audrey 
with an Eton cousin. The blue bow that was pinned 
to her lace frock just matched the color of her eyes. 
The recognition I got was not very cordial, but prob- 
ably the heat affected her. 

“Won’t you come and have some tea?” 

I raised my tones to carry, and gesticulated toward 
Dulcie in the background. 

“ I’m so sorry,” the reply came back. “ I’ve got 
three tables and a coach to visit somehow.” 

“ May I walk round with you ? ” I continued in des- 
peration, for the vision was entrancing. 

“ Bobby is escort, thank you ! ” And Miss Mait- 
land and her Eton boy were swallowed up in the 
stream flowing toward the tents on the practice- 
ground. 

“ Weren’t you rather gone on her? ” asked George, 
watching the reti*eating figures out of sight. 

“ Not a bit,” I said with vehemence. 

“That fellow Hookham wants to marry her,” he 
continued lightly. 

“ Why, he drinks like a fish ! ” 


JULY 


^01 


the first Tve heard of it, and Tve met him 
pretty often.” 

I felt an unreasoning anger rising. 

‘‘Her people couldn't possibly let her do such a 
monstrous thing. Fd break every bone in his body 
if he dared to think of it ! ” 

“ My dear Hanbury,” George interrupted, “ you 
said a moment ago that you didn't care a scrap about 
the girl, and now you lose your temper because some- 
body else does! She can't remain single for ever just 
because you won't either marry her yourself or let 
anybody else do so.'' 

“ She's much too good to throw herself away on a 
fellow like Hookham.'' 

“ Jealous old ass ! '' 

“ Isn't that Lady Lucy making her way over here? '' 
I asked George. 

His face fell, but there was no escape save into the 
fruit salad on the seat behind. Perched up on the 
carriage, he was a cynosure for every eye. 

“ So long, Hanbury,'' he said, as he descended to 
his fate — a quite endurable one in pink muslin. “ I 
invented that yarn about Hookham to pull your solemn 
leg. Anybody can see you are badly hit.'' 

I ! hit ? — That's all the thanks I got for listening to 
George's interminable stories about himself. Next 
time we have a carriage at Lord's, I swear I'll put 
barbed wire round the box seat and keep it to 
myself. 

The duties of a best man, I've always thought, were 
to pay the parson's fee and kiss the bride. Nothing 
of the sort. He has to buy the ring, and the brides- 
maids' presents, keep the peace between the bride's 


202 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


mother and the bridegroom’s, choose the hymns and 
the place for the honeymoon, and stand drinks all 
round. I know all about it since the dose of experi- 
ence that Griffiths’ wedding gave me. I only accepted 
the post of ‘‘bottle-washer in chief” because, without 
my moral support, the Major absolutely refused to 
go through the ceremony. And it was just as well I 
did, since the Major’s idea of marriage had been thus 
expressed to me : 

“ Hang the church business, Hanbury ! I’m all in 
favor of trotting in and out of a registry office, and 
then putting in a fortnight’s salmon-fishing before 
Newmarket.” 

“ My dear Major,” I had replied, “ if you try to cut 
out ‘ The Voice that breathed o’er Eden ’ you’ll hear 
a voice breathing anything but ‘ Eden ’ to you. 
You’ve got to do the thing on the right lines, unless 
you want to be like the Knoxes, who said they hated 
the fuss of a society show, and were married quietly, 
he in his golfing kit and she in her traveling dress, 
before the Registrar of the Strand. The only present 
they got was a silver-gilt porringer from an old aunt, 
who, hearing that some ceremony had taken place, 
assumed it was a christening, and now Millie has to 
wear her wedding ring outside her glove to convince 
people she really is a lawful wife.” 

The Major wasn’t as amenable to advice as I had 
imagined, or wild horses wouldn’t have made me 
undertake the job of overseer. He was continually 
being seized with what he called “ brain waves,” but 
which I have no hesitation in characterizing as in- 
cipient madness. It was all I could do to stop him 
giving the bridesmaids brooches modeled as little 
drinking horns, and one of his presents to the bride 


JULY 


203 


was a combination liqueur set and card table, his 
excuse for the solecism being that it would be ‘‘so 
jolly handy in between the deals/^ Then he wanted 
“ Onward, Christian Soldiers,” played instead of the 
“Wedding March,” because he liked the tune, and the 
gray check trousers he insisted on buying for the cere- 
mony were only suitable for the “five-shilling ring.” 
But I could have put up with all these aberrations of 
conduct if the Major had not developed a heavy sen- 
tentiousness that he unloosed whenever chaff or con- 
gratulation afforded him an opening. We were spared 
none of the good old tags about “ taking up a man’s 
responsibilities,” “ life incomplete without a wife,” 
“the joy of one’s own hearth,” and “the selfishness 
of bachelors.” We all groaned under the weight of 
Griffiths’ platitudes like toads under the harrow. As 
Haines said one night after the Major had left the 
club, “ I don’t mind being lectured by a qualified pro- 
fessor on the subject, but I do object to the most 
ignorant fellow in the room getting on his hind legs 
and talking ‘ through his hat.’ ” 

The unrest of the Major was in sharp contrast to the 
behavior of Mrs. Bellew, whose calm indifference to 
the approaching event was almost indecent, if that 
epithet could ever be used in connection with the lady, 
since her grand manner brings even the vocabulary 
into subjection. Mrs. Bellew retained the most perfect 
self-control, as though marriage in her family were an 
everyday event, instead of a rarity to stir the blood. 
Through all the whirl of purchasing the trousseau 
and the household linen, cataloguing the presents, and 
receiving friends, she moved with majestic serenity. 
“ I believe in letting a girl have her head on an occa- 
sion like this,” was her explanation when I called with 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


^04 

the bridesmaids’ presents, the Major having been at 
his regimental dinner the previous night, and, there- 
fore, hors de combat for the ensuing twenty-four 
hours. It was very unlike Mrs. Bellew to surrender 
her authority so completely, but Faith showed herself 
worthy of her mother’s confidence. The bride-elect 
insisted on St. George’s, Hanover Square; she chose 
a tiara £ioo in excess of the price “Joe” had meant 
as the limit; her bridesmaids’ costumes were selected 
to suit her complexion rather than theirs, and she 
called me “ ridiculous ” when I suggested that it was 
customary for the best man to receive a slight memento 
of the occasion. 

I, in fact, got no consideration. Dulcie and Dolly 
Thurston, who were both bridesmaids, sat in my room 
for hours at a time when I was trying to forget my 
troubles in hard work, because Jermyn Street was 
handy for the couturiere “ creating ” their frocks, and 
they liked my armchairs; I became a trustee of the 
marriage settlement on the insufficient ground that 
I had been called to the Bar ; I ran out of silver thrice 
a day with the greatest regularity settling small bills 
for the Major. But the climax was reached when the 
florist’s men dumped down a forest of ferns and flow- 
erpots in my chambers, and ruined the carpet with 
their boots, under the impression that the reception was 
to be held there. Then I issued an ultimatum to all the 
parties concerned that if I wasn’t left in peace till the 
day itself I’d see the whole show damned before I’d 
be best man. Those were the exact words I uttered, 
the scene being the Bellews’ drawing-room. Where- 
upon Lady Susan Thurston expressed surprise at 
my using such language before the girls, Dulcie 
said “That’s nothing for Gerald,” Mrs. Bellew shud- 


JULY 


S05 


dered just as though some one had walked over her 
grave and given her “ goose-flesh,” Griffiths looked at 
Faith to see what she thought, and thus get a tip for 
his future guidance, while old Bellew saved the 
situation by remarking in a cheerful voice, ‘‘Quite 
right, Hanbury ; don’t you be sat upon ! ” 

My duties on the great day itself weren’t so bad as 
I had anticipated. I made certain of getting my man 
to the church in time by giving him lunch at one 
o’clock in the Carlton grill-room, and plying him full 
of Dutch courage, as a result that I had to restrain 
his impatience to be off, not he mine. I saw that the 
ring was safely stowed away in one of my pockets, 
whence it could be handed to him at the critical 
moment, and that a check for the amount of my dis- 
bursements was also in my possession. I prevented 
the Major taking a hat three sizes too small for him, 
and an umbrella, made in the Year One, from the 
cloakroom, and stopped him telling the taxicab to 
drive him “ Home.” Finally, I steered him safely 
through the varied charms of the bridesmaids waiting 
in the porch of St. George’s, and landed him at the 
altar rails at 2 p. m. sharp. Once there he was safe, 
and I turned a deaf ear to his whispered inquiry, 
“When will the starting-gate lift?” and gave my 
attention to the assembling congregation. 

True to the prevailing custom, the Bellews had 
asked everybody they had ever met in a ’bus in order 
to secure as many presents as possible, taking the 
added precaution of sending a list of the invited guests 
for notice in the Morning Post, so that the world 
might read next day how the Earl and Countess of 
Henley and Lady Lucy Goring were amongst their 
acquaintances, without at the same time becoming 


206 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


aware that the aristocrats did not grace the ceremony 
with their presence, and added insult to injury by 
giving a honbonnihe of cut glass and electro-plate, 
price los. 6d. at the stores, as the incriminating label 
on the back revealed. 

Faith made a handsome bride. Not even Griffiths’ 
best man could use the same epithet of him, but he 
played his part with credit, making the sole slip of 
trying to force the ring on to the bride’s thumb, till 
the officiating clergyman intervened before the victim 
fainted. In the vestry I kissed, not only the bride, 
but the chief bridesmaid, and was proceeding to make 
the grand tour of the whole lot, when the utmost con- 
sternation was caused by the discovery that the bride- 
groom had signed his name in the space reserved for 
Mr. Bellew, so that technically he was his wife’s 
father, within the prohibited degrees of the Church, 
and the marriage void. Flowever, the Courts were 
spared the decision of a nice point of statute and canon 
law, and the papers “a Society Sensation” in their 
‘Mate” editions, by Griffiths correcting his mistake 
with a resolution worthy of a better cause, and sweep- 
ing his bride toward the aisle before the organ had 
started upon Lohengrin. 

The reception at the Bellews’ temporary abode bore 
the features inseparable from such functions — a surg- 
ing throng round the bride as she greeted her friends, 
cut the cake, and went away in a dress of gray foulard, 
her hat of French straw trimmed with humming birds 
and lilac ; the private detective keeping watch over the 
presents, and mistaken for a distinguished diplomat 
so long as he kept his boots out of sight ; the presents 
themselves — the baker’s dozen of fish slices and forks, 
the biscuit boxes and butter dishes without end, the 


JULY 


^01 

volumes of their own works by unread and unreadable 
authors; the dressing-case, ‘‘the gift of the bride’s 
mother to the bridegroom”; the necklace and tiara 
combined from the bridegroom to the bride ; the mass 
of grotesque and useless objects, from menu holders 
shaped like owls, to enough sets of sleeve links to 
stock a jeweler’s shop; — the ill-disguised hostility be- 
tween the circles of Montagu and Capulet, the brides- 
maids acting as lodestones for the few bachelors rash 
enough to appear, the champagne and the ices, and the 
curious throng of the neighborhood lining the red 
carpet on the pavement to catch a glimpse of the fes- 
tivities within, and cheer the bridal pair as they drove 
away for the “ Continong,” via the Lord Warden 
Hotel, Dover. 

At the end of it all I found myself back in my rooms 
with an infernal headache, and the polish trodden off 
a brand new pair of patent leather boots. Such is 
life! 

Ever since Griffiths took up the white man’s burden 
— a wife — I have been conscious of a feeling of mental 
depression, accompanied by the physical phenomenon 
of a sinking sensation under the waistcoat. When a 
band of friends is reduced by even a single one of its 
number, the survivors begin to wonder how soon their 
turn will come to depart. George’s romantic esca- 
pades seem less entertaining, Haines’ wit less pun- 
gent, my bachelor rooms less comfortable. I have 
even caught myself wondering what the Major and 
Faith were talking about at a given moment, and 
whether I shouldn’t, in reality, be happier with fewer 
impulses to gratify, and more occasions for self-sacri- 
fice — always supposing that the right person reaped 


208 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


the benefit of my reformed character. But it is the 
irony of fate that when I do wish to lavish my store 
of affection on a particular object, that object displays 
no eagerness to receive it. Miss Audrey Maitland 
doesn’t think me interesting, or amusing, or a good 
dancer, or, in fact, any of the hundred and one things 
I am reputed to excel in, and on account of which I 
am so inundated with invitations that my right hand 
becomes palsied replying to them. And yet I would 
sooner stand well in Audrey Maitland’s opinion than 
in any other woman’s. It is against all my principles 
to confess as much, but it is the solemn truth. 

Now Cynthia Cochrane does care for me. She may 
not understand me, but she appreciates my stories, 
and is ready with quick sympathy when her feminine 
intuition tells her I have eaten too many oysters, or 
had the check, given to me by a tall stranger in the 
bar of the Criterion,” returned marked ‘‘ No Account. 
Apply to Drawer.” And it was with this craving for 
sympathy uppermost that I determined to spend an 
evening behind the scenes of the Alcazar Theater, and 
see Cynthia make her debut in the leading part of 
Steward’s enormously successful musical comedy. The 
Bird in the Bush. 

To watch the finished product from the stalls is one 
thing; to stand behind and see the same piece built up, 
like a Chinese puzzle, from chaos and incoherence, 
with the aid of call boys, limelight men, scene shifters, 
and the respective members of the cast hopping on 
from the right wing to dovetail a few minutes into the 
picture on the stage, and then whisk off on the left, is 
quite another. An electric bell rings in the dressing- 
rooms reserved for the ladies of the chorus, and 
straightway the narrow passages of the theater are 


JULY 


209 


flooded with a torrent of beauty surging toward the 
stage entrances. There they stand gossiping in sub- 
dued tones under the keen gaze of the stage manager 
and his deputy, until the delivery of their cue by the 
performer of the moment releases them in a hurricane 
of fluttering skirts and waving locks to the song and 
dance which depends on their efforts to tickle the fancy 
of the public and swell the box office receipts. That 
brief part played, back they rush again to resume the 
occupations temporarily abandoned, the needlework, 
the glasses of stout, the paper novels, and the gossip 
of the day. 

The “ Alcazar,” as I saw it on my visit, appealed to 
me as a place of mystery. The dim remoteness of the 
“ flies,” ill which could be discerned the figures of men 
moving far aloft, amidst a network of wires and 
beams, the lights continually changing in color and 
intensity in obedience to the dial of the controlling 
electrician, the distant murmur of the stage and 
orchestra, seeming like an echo from another world, 
so little relation had it to the life behind the scenes — 
all these sights and sounds filled me with an amaze- 
ment which even the very material presences of Mason 
and Drummond, out of the cast of the ‘‘ Frivolity ” for 
a brief season, could not dispel. Of Cynthia I only 
caught a glimpse as she went on in front for the first 
time to speak the opening lines of her part. ‘MVe 
just met such a nice boy, I don’t think. He wanted 
to marry me; but when he told me his income was 
three thousand a year, I said to him, ‘ It may be love ; 
it’s not business ’ ” — wink at the gallery, and fall into 
a chair with a hollow laugh expressive of disillusion- 
ment. From the applause Cynthia got as she went 
through this business, the audience evidently wanted 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


no 

to see more of her, which Drummond assured me they 
would do as soon as she changed into her next 
costume. 

To commence the evening’s experience, Mason took 
me into his private room for cigars and cocktails, 
and when he was called away he left me in charge of 
Drummond to do the rounds. I saw the art of 
** make-up ” directed to change the chief comedian, a 
boyish-looking person on the right side of thirty, into 
an irritable fossil of sixty, who wheezed out drolleries 
from under a thick layer of grease paint and rouge, 
and a bold ‘‘transformation” with side whiskers. I 
passed the time of day with the “first walking gen- 
tleman,” somewhat exhausted from an encore, and 
engaged in speculating whether he could put in a 
hand at poker before his next call. He sat in disarray 
on a large wicker property basket forming the chief 
article of furniture in a room singularly unattractive, 
with its white-washed walls and gas jet flaring in a 
sort of iron cage. Perspiration had plowed deep 
channels in the brick-red complexion that the lime- 
light demands in order to give the effect of natural 
coloring across the footlights, and had imparted a woe- 
begone appearance to him, which so aroused misplaced 
sympathy on my part that, after a whispered aside to 
Drummond, I sent for a bottle of the theater cham- 
pagne, and summoning willing colleagues from next 
door, we drank to the success of the Bird for at least 
another year. 

“ It’s a thirsty life and a short one,” said Drum- 
mond, as we made our way to the wings for Cynthia’s 
song. “Old Omar’s bust ought to be placed over 
every stage door, since we most of us practice his 
philosophy. 


JULY 


m 


** * Drink ! for you know not whence you came, nor why ; 
Drink ! for you know not why you go, nor where.’ ” 


** That explains what is called ^ the glamour of the 
stage/ ” I replied, wedging myself into comparative 
comfort against the slips/’ “ We are all so desper- 
ately anxious to be on nodding terms with the devil, 
that we are ready to be cut by our own circle in order 
to develop the acquaintance/’ 

Cynthia’s song — “That’s how Cleopatra got the 
Needle” — went with a roar from start to finish. Its 
point lay in the play made upon the word needle, 
which in the first verse was the familiar monument on 
the Thames Embankment, in the second was the word 
in its ordinary meaning as an article of sewing, and 
in the last was the term applied by rowing-men to the 
acute physical discomfort known as “ getting the 
needle.” It was this last verse which set the seal of 
success on the number, and it ran as follows — 

Cleopatra nowadays doesn’t like romances. 

Calls Mark Antony * a bore,’ says ‘ she never dances/ 

Never thinks about her hair, or talks of tulle and trimming. 
Spoils her voice for love duets by shouting ‘ Votes for women ! * 

{Chorus) 

Cleo-Cleopatra, you’re a trial to us all. 

To get a vote you’ll threaten, and you’ll wheedle. 

Though we long for peace and quiet. 

You insist on row and riot; 

Oh, Cleopatra, you give us the ‘needle.’” 


Steward had been fortunate in getting the song set 
to a tune which exactly suited the swing of the lyrics. 
Cynthia’s by-play and expressive emphasis had full 
scope in the verses, and as a consequence three encores 
were insisted on, and it was twenty-five minutes be- 


212 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


fore she could get ‘‘ off,” and invite us round to her 
room for a chat. 

We gave Cynthia sufficient grace to enable her to 
effect the greater part of her change of toilette, and 
then marched into her dressing-room, to find her free 
from paint and powder, and as fresh as usual — her 
freshness was one of her stage assets — with a coquet- 
tish toque on her head. An old woman was hanging 
up the varied collection of garments in her mistress’s 
theatrical wardrobe. 

“ Your reputation is made, ma cherie/* was my 
greeting. 

‘‘ Climbed to the top of the tree at one bound,” 
echoed Drummond, mixing his metaphors. 

Cynthia dimpled. 

“ It went nicely, didn’t it ? ” 

I picked up a stocking and began playing with it. 

“ I thought the house would have shouted itself 
hoarse,” I said. 

‘‘ They were dears. I could have hugged them 
all.” 

‘‘ You can begin on me. Miss Cochrane, if you like,” 
insinuated Drummond, always anxious to draw him- 
self in as a subject of conversation. 

“Those who ask don’t deserve to get, Mr. Drum- 
mond.” 

“ I haven’t asked,” I whispered. 

“Those who don’t ask don’t want, Gerald,” and 
Cynthia struck at me with a hare’s-foot brush, trans- 
ferring a patch of rouge from it on to my hand. I 
wiped the stain away with the stocking. 

“ Lawk-a-mussy-me,” cried the old dresser, rescuing 
the article from my grasp, “ you mustn’t do that.” 
And, lest we might do any further damage, she bun- 


JULY 


ns 


died everything in the nature of clothing into the 
baskets and cupboards, locked each in turn, and, bid- 
ding us “ good-night,’' went out. 

A knock came at the door. 

“Mason, ten to one,” said Drummond. But it 
was the commissionaire of the theater, with a large 
shower bouquet of roses, tied with a crimson satin 
ribbon. 

“ Isn’t it beautiful ! ” exclaimed Cynthia, almost 
snatching it from the man’s hands. “ Was there any 
message with it, Sims?” 

“No, miss,” replied the other. “It’s just this mo- 
ment come by special messenger.” 

“ Thank you, Sims,” and Cynthia gave him half a 
crown. The man saluted, and withdrew. 

“Who can it be from?” asked Cynthia, looking to 
see if the ribbon gave any clew to the donor’s identity. 
“ I told Jimmy Berners never to send another flower 
except to my funeral, so it isn’t from him ! ” 

“ What about — Mason ? ” suggested Drummond. 
“ He’s always there, or thereabouts.” 

“ Of course, it’s Mr. Mason,” cried Cynthia. “ He’s 
so thoughtful.” 

“ Are you quite sure it is from Mason ? ” I said, 
with nonchalance. 

“ What do you mean ? It must have been sent by 
Mr. Mason.” 

But Cynthia belied the assurance of her words, by 
diving into the heart of the roses, from which she 
proceeded to draw forth a visiting card. The girl 
cast me a quick glance. Then she read the card. 

“ Why, it’s from you, Gerald ! ” 

Drummond looked at me with envy. “ That was a 
happy idea of yours, Hanbury.” 


214i 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


It was — one of my happiest. 

‘‘ We don’t want the ‘ star ’ to forget her old friends 
now that she has become famous,” I said, with the 
assumption of a lightness I didn’t feel. Sentiment 
was in the air, and I have the Englishman’s horror of 
sentiment. Cynthia had hung her head. When she 
raised it again there was more than a suspicion of 
tears in her eyes. 

I turned to Drummond, and spoke slowly and dis- 
tinctly. 

Drummond, there’s some one shouting for you in 
the passage. If you have the slightest regard for me, 
you’ll close the door softly behind you.” 

The noises of the theater were unaccountably stilled 
as I made the remark, so much so that the place might 
have been solely occupied by mice. It was Drum- 
mond who broke the silence that prevailed. 

‘‘Hanbury, my good friend, the loud summons 
rings in my ears. I will retupn in ten minutes,” and 
he vanished. 

‘‘There goes a man of tact,” I said, and took out 
my cigarette case. 

“ Gerald, dear,” — Cynthia’s voice shook a little, — 
“I never forget old friends. It’s the old friends who 
forget me.” 

“ Even with that bouquet there to prove the con- 
trary,” and I pointed to it in her hand. 

“ It’s not a question of bouquets. Don’t smoke for 
a minute or two,” as I struck a match. “ I want to 
talk seriously to you.” 

I didn’t see how my cigarette would interfere, 
unless “ talking ” was a euphemism for something 
else, but I obeyed. I usually do when “ Cynthia of 
the blue eyes and fair hair ” commands. 


JULY 


215 


“Do you care for me, Gerald?” Cynthia began, 
with disconcerting abruptness. 

“You know I do, Cynthia,” and I took her hand. 

She withdrew it. 

“ Really care for me, I mean, Gerald. We actresses 
get so much false devotion, that we suspect the 
genuineness of any affection. If I thought you were 
like the rest, Gerald, I'd tear these roses to pieces,” 
land, letting the flowers fall to the ground, Cynthia 
pressed her hand over her heart in the stress of her 
emotion. 

Success, instead of intoxicating Cynthia, was en- 
dowing her with a clearer insight than ever into the 
facts of life. More, she was communicating her ex- 
citement to me. But I was resolved to retain control 
over myself. 

“ My dear little girl,” I said, “ what on earth makes 
you talk like this when you ought to be in the seventh 
heaven of delight at your triumph?” 

Cynthia regained her voice with difflculty. She 
was apparently on the verge of a storm of weeping. 
The artistic temperament exacts a heavy toll from its 
possessors. 

“ Sometimes,” she began, “ I think I hate the stage. 
Oh, it's amusing enough, and one’s vanity is flattered 
by the pretty frocks, and the nice things people say to 
one. But to have a heart in it all is to be miserable. 
The men in my own walk of life who care for me I 
wouldn’t touch with a barge-pole ; the men I care for 
are In a rank where marriage with an actress is social 
ruin. Oh, I know that well enough. Everybody 
thinks I’ve got a price, only the nice people don’t say 
so. If it wasn’t that I take a certain pride in my pro- 
fession, and that I thought you looked on me in a 


216 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


different way from the others, Td drown myself to- 
morrow.” 

‘‘ Look here, Cynthia dear ! ” And this time when 
I took her hand she let it remain in mine. “ You are 
overstrung, and tired, and don’t know what you are 
saying. Things aren’t as black as all that.” 

But in my heart of hearts I knew that Cynthia was 
right, and my doubts must have crept into my voice, 
because Cynthia, turning her face to mine, said : 

“ Gerald, I’m not a child, and I know exactly what 
I’m saying. However much I loved a man, if I 
couldn’t get him on my terms, he shouldn’t have me 
on his. I could have had a flat, and a motor-car, and 
furs, and jewelry from one of your sex after another. 
But if I descended into those depths I’d never come 
up again alive. Do you understand?” 

Oh, my God ! ” I said, and stopped. After all, 
there zvas nothing more to be said. 

Cynthia smiled at me through the tears which 
welled up in her clear e}^s, and spoke quite simply. 

‘‘ Gerald, I care for you.” 

I felt like a drowning man. Audrey Maitland 
would never say she cared for me. 

“ Kiss me, Gerald, dear,” Cynthia went on. 

If I had had any strength left I should have pro- 
tested, for I couldn’t kiss her without putting my arm 
around her waist, and I couldn’t put my arm around 
her waist without her laying her head on my 
shoulder. . . . 

When Drummond returned he found Cynthia dab- 
bing her eyes with a lace pocket handkerchief, and 
myself so upset as to be unable to keep a cigarette 
alight. For the life of me I don’t remember what I 
said to Cynthia in those few moments, or what she 


JULY 


said to me. When a woman is sobbing on one’s 
manly chest it is apt to discompose one’s thoughts. 
Also, I was absorbed in the discovery that Cynthia 
had ten distinct shades of color in her hair, and 
the most I had met before on any one head had been 
six. 

“ You two been enjoying yourselves? ” asked Drum- 
mond flippantly. Any man of fine feeling would 
have forborne to mock at what was more tragedy 
than comedy, but it would have been too much to 
expect the self-satisfied Drummond to have any per- 
ception for situations outside his own narrow range 
of emotions. 

“ Mason,” he went on, with irritating cheerfulness, 
“ is as merry as a grig over your turn. Miss Cochrane ; 
swears it’s the best stroke of business he has done for 
many a long day.” 

“Don’t spoil the good impression you created by 
your tact,” I remarked, as I stooped to return Cynthia 
her bouquet. 

“Tact?” said Drummond scornfully. “You as 
good as took me by the shoulders and turned me out.” 

“ Well, it’s a free country. Why didn’t you stop? ” 

“ What ! and have Miss Cynthia tell me I wasn’t 
wanted! Humph!” and Drummond snorted. 

I turned to Cynthia. “He’s a silly fellow, isn’t 
he? ^Good-by, my dear. A demain!'' 

A demain/^ replied Cynthia, with the ghost of a 
smile. 

“ Curse convention,” I muttered in the passage. 
“ If I were worth my salt, I’d see the world damned 
and a good woman saved.” 

“ Convention, my dear Hanbury,” said Drummond, 
with the uncanny aphoristic wisdom he sometimes dis- 


218 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


plays, ^‘is the Providence we invoke to save us from 
ourselves.” 

I looked around at him with surprise. 

“ I believe you’re right,” I said. “ The salvation of 
a good woman doesn’t depend on the effort of a bad 
man.” 


AUGUST 


‘‘Marriage is a trial and an opportunity — ” 

‘Hear, hear!* said I. ‘A trial for the husband and * ** 

Anthony Hope, “The Dolly Dialogues.” 





AUGUST 


Mrs, Mallow is found out — The Parable of the Man 
who did — Romance and a Cricket Week 

O WNERS of grouse moors and yachts may say 
what they please, London in August is an ex- 
tremely habitable spot. There is a spaciousness about 
the town that is refreshing after the crowded pleasures 
of the Season. The absence of one’s friends, the evic- 
tion from one’s club by the hands and brushes of 
painters and decorators, the pavements full of country^ 
cousins, the streets barricaded against traffic, are all 
compensated for by the added sense of freedom and 
the relaxation of the bonds of convention, enabling 
one to indulge in the luxuries of the pit of a theater, 
and the wearing of a flannel collar and brogues in 
Piccadilly. People with a spirit of adventure get that 
spirit pampered during a period of the year when it is 
no longer fashionable to be seen about and when one 
is expected to preserve the incognito of any acquaint- 
ances, male or female, whom one may chance upon 
under circumstances which, in normal times, would 
prove the fruitful parent of scandal. In other words, 
one must wait till recognition given implies recog- 
nition desired, and take a cut direct as meaning noth- 
ing more than that as the cat’s away in Scotland, the 
mouse will play. For Mrs. Grundy is absent at the 
seaside during August, and the proprieties are m cold 
storage. 

Therefore, I was not surprised when, going to a 
certain restaurant to reclaim a walking-stick left on a 
m 


222 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


previous occasion, whom should I find seated on a di- 
van in the vestibule but Mrs. Ponting-Mallow, though, 
to my own knowledge, the old Indian civilian to whom 
she was wedded had gone to Harrogate for the waters 
and a fish diet. The expectant promptitude with 
which the lady sat up as I walked through the swing 
doors from the street, and the mingled disappointment 
and concern which she displayed on seeing my face, 
reflected more credit on her heart than her head. 
Clearly, I was not wanted and somebody else was. 
Barely had I begun to murmur an excuse to justify 
my immediate retreat than the somebody else ” ap- 
peared from the grill-room staircase in the person of 
— Captain Rowan. So rumor for once had not lied, 
like the jade she is, and I prepared to witness the 
rehearsal of a Palais Royal farce. 

At close quarters the Captain showed up to little 
advantage. The bad impression that the glimpse of 
him at Lord’s had given me was strengthened by the 
fellow’s ill-bred familiarity in addressing Mrs. Mallow 
by her Christian name, when his object— before a 
third party — should have been to conceal the intimacy 
of his relations with the lady. Mrs. Mallow, how- 
ever, was too hopelessly infatuated to notice any 
shortcomings on Captain Rowan’s part, and content 
to fix a worshipping gaze on the latter, as though he 
had been the Apollo of Phidias instead of a bad cross 
between the Jubilee Plunger and Count D’Orsay. 

‘‘ I’ve been hunting for you everywhere, Julia,” the 
Captain growled at the lady, paying not the least 
attention to my presence, although Mrs. Mallow had 
attempted an introduction. ‘‘ Do you think I’ve got 
nothing else to do than hang about all day for 
you?” 

‘H’m very sorry,” faltered Mrs. Mallow, her com- 


AUGUST 


223 


posure deserting her still more at this unkind recep- 
tion. My watch was wrong.’’ 

“ Always some excuse,” Rowan grumbled, jingling 
the coins in his trousers pockets, and scowling at the 
clock. “ I expect our table has gone by this time.” 

*‘Do you mind if I leave my things in the cloak- 
room ? ” the lady asked timidly. 

The Captain showed his teeth. “ I’m hanged if I’ll 
wait another moment for you,” he said. 

“That’s not a very considerate way to treat me 
before Mr. Hanbury,” Mrs. Mallow retorted, with a 
show of spirit. 

“ Considerateness be blowed ! ” replied the other. 
“ I’m going in to lunch,” and away he stamped, leav- 
ing the lady to follow as best she could. 

I remained in the hall staring after the pair, lost 
in speculation as to the strangeness of a woman’s affec- 
tions, and the nature of the inducements that a savage 
like the Captain offered to Mrs. Mallow that she 
should risk her reputation in his company. 

The world, as is its way, had put two and two 
together in the case I was considering, and made five. 
The affairs of a pretty woman can never be the con- 
cern of herself alone. With every curl and dimple she 
loses the right to privacy. Therefore, it was common 
property that Ponting-Mallow, C.I.E., had not 
allowed marriage to alter his prenuptial habits, but 
that he still clung to his black tobacco, his discourses 
on the depreciation of the rupee, and his aversion to 
dining out, as though his young wife of seven-and- 
twenty had been the wrong side of forty. He im- 
agined that he had performed his share of the marriage 
partnership when he had given the girl his name, and 
a fraction of his pension as dress allowance. Mallow’s 
whole behavior seemed bent on proving the truth of 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


the French aphorism, ‘‘ The bonds of matrimony are 
so heavy that it takes two to carry them — sometimes 
three/’ Wherefore Mrs. Mallow and the Captain in 
the restaurant trying to readjust the weight, and 
myself wondering at the perversity of things. 

In spite of my natural curiosity, I made no attempt 
to follow up the clew put into my possession by that 
afternoon’s meeting. But chance intervened on my 
behalf a few days later, as though Providence desired 
my collaboration in the working out of the whole 
affair. 

The Old Welcome Club, at the Earl’s Court 
Exhibition, is a favorite haunt of mine on summer 
nights, in which to create those fancies that form, 
when turned into salable prose, the bread and butter 
of the literary man. As a matter of fact, I have some 
ideas for a light comedy a la Wyndham, and the 
purple vault of the sky, spangled with glittering 
clusters of stars, the peaceful lawn fringed by the 
shifting crowds of pleasure -seekers without, and the 
occasional melody of the band, afford a favorable 
medium for my imagination’s growth. Thus it was 
that I was seated in the club enclosure, my hat tilted 
over my face, lost in a fairyland of my own thoughts, 
when a voice from the terrestrial world I had left 
broke in upon my musings. 

We can see here, without being seen,” exclaimed 
the speaker — a woman — close behind me, paying no 
attention to the quiet figure in front. 

My senses, only half roused from reverie, failed to 
identify the familiar accent till her companion sup- 
plied the missing link of memory by remarking, ‘‘ It 
doesn’t much matter where we settle down, so long as 
we sit somewhere precious soon,” 


AUGUST 


S25 


Why, it was Mrs. Mallow and her Captain! I 
prepared to play the eavesdroppper with no more com- 
punction than I should have felt if I had been put 
into a position for overhearing the plans of revolu- 
tionaries. 

‘‘ Have you heard from the old man again ? ” began 
the Captain, striking a match preparatory to light- 
ing up. 

I had to strain my hearing to catch Mrs. Mallow’s 
almost whispered reply. 

‘‘Yes, Ponting is anxious to know when I shall 
join him, as he doesn’t like his present attendant, and 
he thinks I shall look after him better. Why didn’t 
he marry a hospital nurse ? ” A bitter laugh ended 
the sentence. 

“What made you ever take on the job?” Rowan 
asked. I had a shrewd suspicion he wished to steer 
the conversation off the rocks of self. If so, he was 
disappointed. 

“ I suppose I was tired of being at home,” the lady 
replied wearily, “ and took the first chance of freedom 
that offered. Freedom, indeed!” and again there 
came that laugh of disillusionment. “I didn’t real- 
ize,” she went on, “the greatness of my mistake till 
I met you, Stuart.” 

Here, so I judged, Mrs. Mallow attempted an affec- 
tionate clasp of her companion’s hand. The endear- 
ment was lost on Rowan. 

“Look here, Julia,” he said, with blunt directness 
that showed he had collected his mental forces for a 
crisis; “we’ve been playing this boy and girl non- 
sense long enough.” 

“ Stuart, what do you mean? ” gasped Mrs, Mallow 
under the shock of this cold douche, 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


ne 


“What I say. We can’t go on as we have been 
any longer. I’m not prepared to stand the racket of 
the Courts, even if you are.” 

“ The Courts? ” 

“Oh, you know well enough that weVe practically 
spent the last six weeks in each other’s company. It’s 
time to ring off.” 

“ Surely, Stuart,” and the lady’s voice was tremu- 
lous with suppressed emotion, “you can’t expect me 
to go back to Ponting when you know how I feel 
toward him! Ask me to do anything but that! I 
can’t act a lie to my husband.” 

“One lie more or less doesn’t matter,” said the 
Captain, his annoyance increasing at the resistance he 
was encountering. “Anyhow, you can’t stop with 
me.” 

“You’re very unkind, Stuart,” and Mrs. Mallow 
began to sob. “ I t-trusted you, and now you are 
g-going to l-leave me.” 

That’s where women so often make the mistake 
that costs them everything. They trust the wrong 
man. But if a fellow’s tie is all right he may be the 
biggest blackguard under the sun for all the fair sex 
cares, in the same way that a girl with a “ strawberry 
and cream ” complexion is always presumed by her 
partners to be an angel. 

“ My dear Julia,” exclaimed Rowan angrily, “ don’t 
make an infernal noise like that! Facts are facts. 
You’re not going to be such a fool as to leave your 
husband, and I’m not going to be such a fool as to 
help you ! ” 

“I’ve d-decelved him once,” whimpered little Mrs. 
Mallow, oblivious of her surroundings, as she was 
overwhelmed by the torrent of her misery. “ I shall 


AUGUST 


227 


be d-deceiving him the rest of my life if I r-return 
to him.” 

In the crises of life women are remorseless logicians. 
They brush aside the arguments of casuistry, to pierce 
to the heart of the issue. I had it in my mind to 
admire the skill with which the lady cross-examined 
herself. The Captain, however, regarded the matter 
very differently. Called upon to pay the price of an 
intrigue of which he was already tired, he found him- 
self confronted by a display of emotion which he did 
not share, and a situation which his sole object was 
to escape from with all speed. Characteristically, he 
took the roughest way about it. 

“If you can’t control yourself,” growled the Cap- 
tain, “ I shall leave you to yourself. As for thinking 
you can’t go back to that husband of yours, that’s 
all tommy-rot. You’ll find lots of other fellows to 
play about with, and you’ll not be the only woman 
by a long chalk who has kicked over the traces at one 
period of her married life, and then gone straight in 
double harness afterward. You thought Ponting- 
Mallow good enough to marry; you’ve got to think 
him good enough to live with.” 

If it had been a man Rowan had been talking to, 
he would have been lying on his back after that speech 
with two black eyes and a damaged nose. But the 
frank brutality of his words seemed to act like a 
cautery on poor Mrs. Mallow’s bleeding affections, for 
after a moment’s silence she checked the flow of her 
tears, sniffled several times as she regained control of 
her feelings, and finally rose to her feet with the 
quavering remark: 

“ If it makes you angry, Stuart, I’ll try not to be 
a fool, but don’t leave me here alone ! ” 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


ns 

Having silenced the opposition to his satisfaction, 
the Captain was all honey and treacle again. 

That’s right, little woman,” he said. I knew 
you’d be sensible.” 

As I screwed round my head to catch a glimpse of 
the departing pair, I saw Rowan pass his arm through 
the lady’s, and escort her out of view. 

I mentioned the matter to George the next day, 
when I met him in Bond Street wearing a straw hat 
with an I. Z. ribbon, and just off to the cricket week at 
Henley Park, for which Lady Lucy Goring’s im- 
portunity had procured him an invitation. I hadn’t 
forgotten it was he who had first put me on the scent 
of the intrigue. 

‘‘ If that bounder Rowan,” said George, “ thinks he 
can drop Mrs. Mallow like a hot coal as soon as he 
has burned his fingers, he’s making the mistake of his 
life. She seems a pliant little thing, but she’s as 
tough as they make ’em. If he wants a letter to his 
colonel, he’s going about the right way to get it. 
And between you and me and the doorpost, Han- 
bury, the fellow will deserve all he gets.” 

‘‘ What’s up ? ” I asked. ‘‘ Do you know any- 
thing?” 

“ I met a messmate of Rowan’s the other day, and 
he told me they’d done all they could to clear him 
out of the Service. But he has the hide of a rhi- 
noceros, and after they’d ragged his quarters for three 
months on end to show him he wasn’t wanted, and he 
still turned up smiling, they gave it up as a bad job. 
Roman’s already broken up one happy home at Simla, 
and he’s qualifying for a ‘ bust up ’ in another estab- 
lishment besides the Mallows’.” 

Any good dropping a hint as to what we know, 
George? 


AUGUST 


229 


‘‘ Don’t you worry, ‘ young- fellow-me-lad ’ ! Trust 
a woman and a Jew to manage their own affairs ! ” 

So I left it at that. 

Hang Society! What has it ever done for me 
except exhaust my balance at the bank, and raise my 
tailor’s bill to a height at which I can never hope to 
settle it, unless I were to discover a gold mine under 
the pavement of Jermyn Street, or inherit a block of 
flats in the most eligible quarter of the town from a 
charitable — and fictitious — aunt. Society is an assem- 
blage of people with more money than brains, and 
more leisure than either, drawn together for the pur- 
poses of mutual amusement. When the pleasures 
Society indulges in cease to attract him, why should 
a man remain in the charmed circle instead of seeking 
happiness outside it? That’s the way I feel, and its 
source is Cynthia Cochrane. On that night at the 
‘‘Alcazar” the barrier between us was broken down, 
and Cynthia’s letters to me since have taken on a 
warmth of tone that makes coolness on my part diffi- 
cult, if not impossible. Forced to spend the first half 
of August in town through pressure of work arising 
out of a wish to start my holidays with no commis- 
sions unfinished, I have had ample opportunity for 
considering the question of Cynthia in all its aspects. 
I have wandered in the parks on hot windless nights, 
my forehead bared to the glories of the summer sky; 
I have sat in my window overlooking Jermyn Street, 
a pipe between my teeth, heedless of the flight of time, 
and ever have I revolved the problem of my relations 
to the actress. 

Why is marriage with an actress looked upon by 
one’s womenkind as an unpardonable offense, for 
which no penance of bell, book and candle can atone? 


230 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


I once thought it was jealousy which actuated the 
hostility, jealousy against a rival who employed 
weapons of direct glances, unabashed coquetry, and 
feminine unscrupulousness, which the more civilized 
of the sex looked upon in the same light as the 
Powers of Europe do upon poisoned bullets and 
picric acid bombs. But I don't think so now. The 
average woman, I believe, regards the profession of 
acting as in some vague way outraging the sacredness 
with which her sex is vested in the eyes of men, tear- 
ing away a veil which should remain inviolate. By 
conniving at this sacrilege the actress is a traitress to 
her sex's self-respect. This point of view is never 
defined, it rarely finds expression, but the conviction 
lies at the root of the attitude which is adopted to- 
ward the stage by nine out of ten women. And it is 
that factor which determines the equivocal position in 
which I stand toward Cynthia. That — and the ex- 
perience of Hugh Mercer, which I will chronicle here 
under the title of 

THE PARABLE OF THE MAN WHO DID 

Hugh Mercer was at a time of life when he was free 
from the impulses of youth, and not yet subject to 
the vacillations of age. He had a comfortable income, 
a nice little place in the best part of Surrey, and he 
was an object of interest to a wide circle in town and 
out. He could have aspired to the hand of a baron's 
daughter, a baronet's sister, or the relict of a wealthy 
stockbroker, without undue ambition being gratified 
by the alliance. In fact he was a ‘‘ catch," and spoilt 
accordingly. But as fate willed it, what should he do 
one Eastertide at Brighton but get introduced to Miss 


AUGUST 


Delia Foster, who was ** resting ” between her theatri- 
cal engagements ! She was just such another as 
Cynthia, with instincts of domesticity which had not 
been eradicated by four years in legitimate drama, 
self-possessed without being bold, and a general 
aspect of what the Society papers describe as “ being 
in great good looks.’’ Mercer was in a dangerous 
frame of mind. He had nothing to say to the average 
debutante of commerce, he hated Mrs. Grundy and 
all her tribe like poison, and he had lost all patience 
with the conventional and stereotyped outlook of the 
dowagers who asked him to lunch in the hope that he 
would propose to their daughters afterward. 

Delia Foster gave Hugh Mercer exactly what he 
wanted in the way of companionship and repartee, 
making him feel that at last he had found unconven- 
tionality with refinement, wit with propriety, and that 
marriage might begin romance, instead of end it. 
Without running after Mercer, Delia Foster let him 
see that so far as she was concerned, he was ‘‘ the only 
pebble on the beach.” A surprisingly handsome girl, 
she wore clothes as they were meant to be worn, and 
didn’t put on a ball dress as though it were a peignoir. 
She had a figure which really was a figure, and her 
waist was not like a proposition of Euclid’s ‘‘two 
straight lines which, being infinitely produced, will 
never meet.” The stage had given her humanity 
without taking away her womanhood, grace without 
depriving her of virtue. She was as pretty as seven, 
and as fascinating as ten. 

Mercer’s whole education had been in the direction 
that his instincts, as distinct from his impulses, were 
to be obeyed. In one short week he had made up 
his mind to marry Delia, confident that his wife could 


232 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


go where Miss Foster’’ couldn’t, and that his friends 
would see in her the same charms that he did. So he 
got a special license, took the manager of his hotel 
as witness, sent a wire to his old mother after the 
ceremony, — ‘‘ Am bringing home a charming bride 
from the stage for your blessing,” — and went on a 
honeymoon of three days to see Delia’s old company 
in The Silver King at the Theater Royal, Glasgow. 
When they came back to Eaton Place, old Mrs. Mer- 
cer had barely recovered from the hysterics into which 
Hugh’s telegram had sent her, and she was quite un- 
able to receive her daughter-in-law. Thereupon Mer- 
cer installed his bride at a smart hotel, and proceeded 
to break the good news to his friends. 

But for the bearer of glad tidings he received a 
chilling reception. The benedict cannot expect the 
same consideration as the bachelor, even should he 
be married to one of the most popular girls in his own 
set. Until the inequality of the sexes is remedied, and 
men outnumber women, mothers must reserve the 
hospitality of their houses for those who can help to 
relieve the female congestion at home. But when a 
man adds insult to injury by marrying an actress, he 
is indeed outside the pale, and, as he cannot be chas- 
tised direct, he is punished through his wife. And so 
Hugh Mercer found. If he called alone he was 
treated as a silly young man who ought to have known 
better. When Delia accompanied him people became 
unaccountably shortsighted. Invitations sent out in 
the name of “ Mr. & Mrs. Hugh Mercer ” for a 
dinner party were one and all refused, ‘‘ with many 
regrets owing to a previous engagement.” Folks were 
quite ready to accept Hugh “on his own,” but they 
showed no inclination to extend a like toleration to 


AUGUST 


233 


his wife. His mother did express a wish to see Hugh’s 
bride, but Delia was so nervous that she spilled her tea 
during the interview, and confirmed the old lady’s 
worst suspicions about ‘‘ The Profession.” Delia 
looked all right, and talked all right, with a great deal 
more sense than her censors would have shown, but 
she had been on the Stage, and that was enough. 

Exasperated by his failure to get Delia taken up, 
Hugh Mercer shook the dust of London from his feet 
and retired to his country home, where he spared no 
pains to create a good impression round the country- 
side. Always ready to be amused, people accepted as 
much hospitality as he cared to offer, and criticised 
the hostess behind his back. The fact was that Delia’s 
reversion from the standard type was unmistakable. 
She couldn’t have looked like an ordinary woman had 
she tried for a month, and the woman out of the 
common is never forgiven by her sisters unless she 
marries into the peerage, or is born there. She was 
clever, without having the cleverness to conceal the 
fact. Had she been wiser, she would have cut off 
three-quarters of her lovely hair, and dyed the rest 
black, let out her waist three inches, worn unbecoming 
dresses, and aspired to no wider knowledge than the 
best method of cleaning cretonnes. Then she would 
have turned every woman on her husband’s visiting 
list from a bitter rival into a stanch friend, anxious 
to show the new Mrs. Mercer that they didn’t think 
any the worse of her because of her unfortunate ante- 
cedents. Women may tolerate the presence in their 
own sphere, by right of inheritance, of one who out- 
shines them, but they will never endure the importa- 
tion of such a creature ” from the lower stratum of 
society. In trying to graft his wife on to his family 


234 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


tree, Hugh Mercer was attempting an impossible task. 
He was merely running his head against a brick wall, 
and not doing the wall any damage. After a few 
months he shrugged his shoulders, and went back to 
his club, and his men friends, who liked Mrs. Hugh 
because she was amusing, and didn’t mind their smok- 
ing in the drawing-room. 

So far Delia had acquiesced in her husband’s at- 
tempt to rehabilitate her socially, since, being genu- 
inely fond of him, she was desirous of conciliating his 
friends, with the object of giving him pleasure. But 
when she found that no amount of deference and 
flattery could placate the hostility aroused by her 
uncommon beauty and independence of mind, Delia 
began to get restive. Upon her marriage she had, at 
Hugh’s request, dropped her former acquaintances, 
much to her own regret, because she was a companion- 
able person. But when no substitutes were provided 
to All the vacancies so created in her affections, she 
announced one day that she intended resuming rela- 
tions with Phyllis, and Maud, and Otto, and Julian. 
Naturally, Hugh didn’t like the idea, and, naturally, 
being a man, he said so, and plunged headlong into 
the first serious quarrel of his married life, which Delia 
ended by marching straight out of the house — they 
were installed in Eaton Place by this time, Mrs. 
Mercer, senior, having decamped abroad for good. 

Having tasted again the savor of the old environ- 
ment, Delia found her new surroundings insupport- 
able. She couldn’t think what Hugh saw in the 
‘‘ snuffy ” women of his set to make him tolerate the 
rudeness they meted out to his own wife, and the 
breach between the couple, once opened, rapidly and in- 
evitably widened. The time, which Delia had found 


AUGUST 


235 


hung heavy on her hands during her imprisonment in a 
mode of living foreign to her temperament, and only 
endured for the sake of the man she had loved, re- 
sumed its swift and enthralling flight amidst the asso- 
ciations of her stage days. Hugh refused to meet any 
of the actors and actresses with whom Delia consorted, 
and thus deprived himself of any power to supervise 
her acquaintances. Before long Delia was offered an 
engagement which she was prompt to accept, — Hugh’s 
remonstrances having long ceased to carry any weight, 
— and she was irretrievably drawn back into that pro- 
fession from which Hugh, in an unfortunate moment 
for both of them, had snatched her. Smarting under 
a sense of injustice, Hugh received the assurances of 
his women friends that it was all Delia’s fault as so 
much gospel truth. He was persuaded to bide his 
time, and then set the law in motion to regain the free- 
dom which he should have lost only to a woman who 
was as dowdy as she was dull. 

To this day Hugh walks his clubs with the aspect 
of a man who has drained the cup of life to the dregs, 
and found the draught exceeding bitter. Over his 
tombstone will be set up this inscription: 

Here lies 

HUGH MERCER, 

The man who Did 
and 

Was Done 

t*i .... I.- 

I am still wondering why the Steins asked me down 
for the cricket week at Lowdon Castle, and why I 


236 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


accepted. In the first place, Fm no Gilbert Jessop at 
the national game, and if I can stay in two overs, get 
one run past point, “ snick ” another through the 
slips and hook a half-volley to leg, Fve earned the 
generous applause of the spectators, and a long drink 
with straws in it. In the second place, I know the 
Steins well enough to cut them. Hermann Stein is 
termed euphemistically ‘‘ a master of high finance,’’ 
but, as Archie Haines says, A master of high finance 
usually plays it very low down,” and if Stein got his 
deserts for certain business transactions he would 
probably be His Majesty’s guest for several years. As 
Society realizes that if it insisted on title-deeds to its 
esteem from every aspirant for its favors, it would 
shrink to dimensions which a single drawing-room 
could accommodate, a wise tolerance is shown toward 
the past of those who, like Stein, can feed the hungry 
aristocrat and rent his ancestral acres. Therefore, I 
thought of the millions behind my would-be hosts, 
and their anxiety to squander them in style, and came 
to the conclusion that I might go further and fare 
worse. To refuse the proffered hand of friendship is 
churlish — ^and, if that hand be full of golden guineas, 
foolish as well. 

Every good deed has its reward, and the first person 
I encountered on the platform at Southampton, where 
the 40-h.p. Renault met us, was Audrey Maitland. 
Her delightful presence was explained on the same 
grounds as accounted for every other guest at Low- 
don. She had come with a friend of a friend of the 
Steins, assured that “It doesn’t matter in the least 
not knowing your hosts. Nobody knows. But every 
one stays at Lowdon, and you’ve done very well.” 
The incontrovertible logic of this had brought together 


AUGUST 


237 


a tolerable house party, and not on false pretenses 
either, for if powdered footmen behind every chair, a 
display of gold plate worthy of royalty, a menu as 
long as one’s arm prepared by the ex-chef of the Paris 
Ritz, motors galore and a launch always under steam 
be “doing you well,” we vcere done well. If any 
charge could be brought against Stein, it was that he 
overdid his hospitality. For all the peace and quiet 
his guests enjoyed, they might have been living in 
Hengler’s Circus, instead of in the loveliest place on 
the south coast. During the cricket matches against 
the Gentlemen of Hampshire and the Greenjackets, a 
band blared out popular melodies for the edification of 
the swarm of country folk who graced the functions. 
At night, if it weren’t dancing in a marquee on the 
terrace, — the Castle battlements outlined with fairy 
lamps, and the trees hung with lanterns, — there was a 
variety entertainment by performers from town, or a 
display of fireworks from a raft anchored off the 
grounds — during which, by the by, great enthusiasm 
was created by a set piece representing the host and 
hostess, in which the portion forming the mimic Mr. 
Stein’s nose ignited before the rest, and presented a 
glowing design of a striking natural feature. 

The chief obstacle to everybody’s enjoyment was the 
Steins themselves. In the fine feudal palace, over- 
looking Southampton Water, with its ivy-clad walls 
twelve feet thick, its moat, its banqueting-hall black 
with age, its atmosphere of stately tradition, the Steins 
were as much at home as slugs in a gold cup. They 
couldn’t have chosen a setting less calculated to 
enhance their social worth. The Misses Stein, true 
Roses of Sharon, with bold black eyes, and figures 
that it was a positive cruelty to imprison within the 


S38 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


narrow confines of a fashionable frock, were continu- 
ally changing from one garment, fearfully and won- 
derfully made, into another. Mrs. Stein, bewildered 
by the unfamiliarity of her surroundings, was far too 
busy getting into bodice after bodice at her daughters’ 
bidding, to shed luster on the social position of her 
masterful lord and master. And if there was one 
person less objectionable than old Stein — with his 
habitual inquiry, just as though he were the butler, 
whether he could do anything for one, and to which 
no person had the courage to suggest that he might 
sink himself in his own launch to the general satisfac- 
tion — it was his truly Semitic son and heir. I took 
a dislike to that young hopeful the moment I set eyes 
on him, and he did not lessen it by paying odious 
court to Audrey Maitland, of all people. 

It is surely carrying a sense of obligation too far to 
return the hospitality of the father by smiling on the 
son, and yet I couldn’t find any other reason to 
explain why, if Miss Maitland did not exactly let 
Jacob, junior, monopolize her, she went very near do- 
ing so. I had a serious bone to pick with the fellow 
over it. At a critical period of our match with the 
Green jackets I went in to try to stop the rot in the 
Lowdon Castle team, caused by the bowling of a lanky 
subaltern from the Rifle Brigade depot, who had been 
slinging down fast balls with such effect that six of 
our wickets had fallen for 75 runs, a feeble reply to 
the 180 knocked up by our opponents. I was leaving 
the pavilion, weighted with a sense of responsibility, 
when I happened to see the Jew boy keeping Audrey 
company under the trees, and actually making her 
laugh. I walked to the wickets “seeing red,” dug 
a hole in the batting-crease deep enough for Stein’s 


AUGUST 


239 


grave, an 3 smote at the first ball sent down in a blind 
fury inspired by the thought that I was aiming a 
mortal blow at his curly head. The ball missed the 
stumps by a hand’s breadth, but I overdid my stroke 
to such an extent that the bat continued its wild sweep 
until it scattered the stumps in all directions. ‘‘ Seven 
wickets for 75, last player o,” was the cheerful an- 
nouncement that greeted me on my return. I was in 
no mood for Miss Maitland’s crocodile sympathy. 

You were so interested in Stein and his funny 
stories,” I sputtered, in my rage and shame, that you 
couldn’t have seen any of the play.” 

Before she could turn aside the just rebuke, I had 
passed on to the pavilion, and the stiffest drink I could 
mix. 

There is no surer way of getting snubbed than by 
offering advice to a woman on her choice of friends. 
Such is the perversity of the sex that forbidden fruit 
becomes the most desirable article of diet. I can’t 
carry the analogy of fruit into the case of Stein, since 
the term applied to him sounds ridiculous. He was 
either prickly pear or a monkey-nut. Fortunately, 
however, before I took the law into my own hands, 
and had recourse to actual violence, Stein himself re- 
leased me from the horrible position of spectator to 
his infatuation — 3, spectator powerless to intervene, 
lest I should incur the charge of interference. 

About halfway through the ball that took place on 
the night of our victory over the Hampshire Gentle- 
men, I was standing by the garden side of the 
marquee, smoking a cigarette, with a recklessness of 
manner consequent on having cut most of my part- 
ners, when Miss Maitland walked rapidly round the 
corner of the tent upon me, and asked me to take her 


S40 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


where she could rest, as she felt tired. It is a habit 
of mine to keep a weather-eye open for secluded spots 
in case a need of them should arise, so I was not long 
in seating the lady at the end of a pergola in the 
French garden, which forms one of the beauties of 
Lowdon — a spot where the crescent moon shone 
through the rose-covered roof, and the summer scents 
hung heavy in the air. 

What was it that comprised the charm radiating 
from Audrey Maitland ? I revolved the problem while 
I sat back with folded arms and watched my com- 
panion tapping on the stone causeway with one dainty 
foot. Distinction was written plain in every feature, 
in the delicate line of her nose, in the peach-bloom 
of her soft cheeks, in her mouth curved like a Cupid’s 
bow, in her graceful little head set on the white pillar 
of her neck, and wreathed in an aureole of most de- 
licious curls. But beauty alone can never hold my 
devotion, though it may attract it. I must find intel- 
ligence, an interest in things which the ancients de- 
scribed as ‘‘the humanities.” Life is too brief to be 
wasted on trivialities to the exclusion of those sub- 
jects which have stirred the curiosity, and stimulated 
the thought, of successive generations. I prefer to 
talk about the achievements of great men of the past, 
rather than the doings of small men of the present. 
One may be excused for not knowing about Mr. Pon- 
sonby de Tomkyns, but to be ignorant of Francis 
Bacon is unpardonable. I may chatter scandal in a 
ballroom with my partner of the moment, but if I 
am to share my library it will only be with a wife who 
cares as little for gossip, and as much for Edmund 
Burke, as I do. Audrey Maitland was a woman after 
xny own heart. She was sweet-tempered, yet shrewd ; 


AUGUST 


'^41 


clever without malice ; feminine without folly ; neither 
jealous of her own sex, nor suspicious of mine; broad- 
minded, tolerant, and with interests which never run 
dry even in the drought of Society, to which a worldly 
mother condemned her for nine months out of 
twelve. This was the considered judgment mentally 
delivered during the five minutes of silence which fol- 
lowed after we had both taken our places on the old 
oak seat in the pergola that night in August. 

“ What a horrible young man ! ’’ said Miss Maitland 
at length, shuddering in spite of the warmth of the 
incense-laden atmosphere. 

‘‘ Have you only just discovered that fact? ” I asked, 
with a joy I tried hard to conceal. 

‘‘ He tried to kiss me ! ’’ the girl went on, too ab- 
sorbed in her own feelings to notice mine. “ Oh, I 
wish mother had never made me come down here. I 
told her the Steins were quite impossible.'’ 

“ Shall I go and throw the fellow into the moat?" 
I suggested, with the idea of consoling her. 

‘‘And have everybody talking about why you did 
it? No, thank you, Mr. Hanbury." 

“ I shouldn't worry long over the likes of him." 

“ The thought which tortures me is that I must have 
made him think I was the sort of girl he could kiss." 
Audrey Maitland hung her head, her cheeks pink with 
annoyance. 

“ Did he try to make love to you ? ” I asked, em- 
boldened to do so by the fact that her anger against 
young Stein was making the girl more confidential to 
me than she had ever been during the Season. 

“ He paid me silly compliments, but I never thought 
he could be such a cad as to take advantage of my 
politeness to him because he was the son of the house. 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


242 


We were sitting out on the terrace when he put one 

horrid arm round my waist, and — and ” But here 

Audrey Maitland’s disgust got the better of her can- 
dor, and hiding her face behind her hands she broke 
off abruptly. 

“ The brute ! ” I muttered. “ Now if you had treated 
him as you have always treated me, the thing could 
never have happened.” 

Miss Maitland’s hands dropped, and she turned to 
me. 

‘‘How have I always treated you, Mr. Hanbury?” 
she asked in frank surprise. 

“ Come,” I said, “ you surely don’t need to be en- 
lightened on the fact that from the moment when we 
first met, you have done all you could to show your 
dislike for me. Think of the Bratons’ ball, of Ascot, 
of Lord’s — nothing but snubs, snubs, snubs.” 

As I uttered the indictment a wave of such sorrow 
for myself swept over me that I nearly copied my 
companion’s example and buried my face in my hands. 

The girl took my outburst with due seriousness. 

I’m so very sorry you’ve taken it like that, only I 
thought from something you said to me in London 
that you wanted to make love to me, and of course I 
couldnT have allowed that.” 

“Of course not,” I replied quickly. “You couldn’t 
allow a man whose whole body isn’t worth your little 
finger to have the presumption to make love to you.” 

“I didn’t mean that at all,” and Miss Maitland 
spoke in tones of distress. “ You twist what I say so 
that I don’t know really what I do mean. Oughtn’t 
we to be going back? ” and she made as if to rise. 

“What, and run into the arms of the Stein boy 
again? No fear. You can’t snub a fellow like him, 


AUGUST 


243 


and he’ll be pestering you for forgiveness and an- 
other dance.” 

My diplomacy was successful, for the girl sank back 
again. 

“ May I call you ‘ Audrey ’ ? ” I began. “ It’s ab- 
surd to address each other as ‘ Miss Maitland ’ and 
‘ Mr. Hanbury ’ as though we were strangers.” 

“ I don’t think I ought to,” my companion replied, 
turning her face away so that I had no clew as to her 
thoughts. 

‘‘ It’s not a question of what you ‘ ought ’ to do, but 
what you ‘ want ’ to do.” 

‘‘ Ought I to want it ? ” 

Audrey Maitland might have been laughing, for all 
I knew. 

‘‘ I don’t presume to say, but I do, — Audrey ! ” It 
was a bold stroke, but it proved successful. 

“Well, I suppose I will then, — Gerald. Now we 
really must go back.” 

“ Is there any chance of supper with you? ” I ven- 
tured, as I guided her by the longest route I could 
to the marquee, and the crowd, every detail of which 
had suddenly become hateful after the peace and inti- 
macy of the pergola, and its roses, 

“ You’re in a very ‘ asking’ mood to-night,” smiled 
Audrey to me. “ But just for a treat you may — and a 
table by ourselves.” 

I managed it all right, and we sat in our oriel till 
lights shone faint and faces showed haggard as the 
pale dawn brightened in the sky. We ranged over 
every topic, surprised at the similarity of our tastes, 
the community of our interests and an intellectual 
sympathy which showed itself by one uttering the un- 
spoken thoughts of the other. If I had admired the 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


girl at a distance, my admiration turned to a far 
deeper feeling when I found how little separated us, 
and how much united. If her beauty had ensnared 
my physical nature, her wit, her sympathy, her insight 
led my soul in chains. I went to bed in an ecstasy of 
sentiment, to toss sleeplessly as my imagination re- 
created her charms to haunt and tantalize me. 

For the rest of my visit to Lowdon I was an un- 
satisfactory guest. When Audrey wasn’t with me — 
she had the cleverness not to reserve her company for 
me alone — I was morose and distrait, so much so that 
I nearly ran the launch aground on a sand-bank 
through watching the girl when I was at the helm ; I 
was barely civil to young Stein, although I ought to 
have been deeply grateful for his indiscretion and its 
consequences; I nearly had a row with the head gar- 
dener, because he found me cutting the roses in the 
French garden to make into a bouquet. Altogether 
I was gloriously indifferent to those social amenities 
upon which life in country houses is established, and 
my obliviousness to all except the presence of Audrey 
was heightened by the fact that we were to be fellow 
guests the following month at Mr. Thurston’s lodge 
in the wilds of Rosshire. This prospect led me to 
effusively thank the Steins, when the time of depar- 
ture came, with a genial heartiness which so wrought 
upon the old man that he gave me the name of his 
broker and some advice as to profitable investments. 
If the terms of friendship can be estimated with any 
accuracy in pounds, shillings, and pence, fifteen per 
cent — that was what old Stein promised me — takes 
some beating. 


SEPTEMBER 


There’s nothing in the world so noble as a man of sentiment .” — 
Sheridan, “ The School for Scandal,” Act IV. 


I 




SEPTEMBER 


Steward makes a Confession of Faith — Ben Machree 
Lodge, Rosshire, N.B. — George Burn's Escapade at 
Dieppe 

A fter the pandemonium of Lowdon and the cloy- 
. ing richness of the Steins’ hospitality, I was 
glad to put in a quiet fortnight at home with our own 
partridges before migrating north to catch Thurston’s 
salmon and stalk his stags. It is rarely that I put in 
an appearance at all under the ancestral roof during 
the autumn, so my arrival was treated by my family as 
a windfall, the discussion of domestic problems to be 
relegated, accordingly, to the background for the dura- 
tion of my visit. 

So hypnotic were the sounds and silences of the 
countryside to my urban soul, and so magical the 
slumber into which they lulled my senses, that it was 
as much as the keeper could do to rouse me to tramp 
through the root-fields and newly cut stubbles after 
the little brown birds. For the most part, I was con- 
tent to drowse away the sunlit hours amidst the hum 
of bees, and the soothing symphonies of distant reap- 
ing machines, while Dulcie, in the summeriest of 
summer costumes, forgot her shattered romance of the 
season in her efforts to perfect her service at tennis, 
and take the curate’s volleys backhanded. Dulcie, in 
fact, had developed into a furious devotee of exercise, 
and the spiritual affairs of the parish must have been 
sadly neglected, from the way she tempted the curate 
from his duties to run up and down the base line of 

247 


^48 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


the court for set after set. When I remonstrated with 
my sister for her action, she merely exclaimed, — with 
that fine disregard for the higher life which her sex 
can show when it conflicts with feminine inclinations, 
— Tm sure Mr. Sturgis is far better playing with me 
than visiting tiresome old women whoVe nothing 
really the matter with them.’^ 

I was glad Dulcie should find pleasure in anybody’s 
company — even though only a curate’s. A round col- 
lar and a black straw hat don’t make a man a knave 
in my eyes, as they most unquestionably do in my 
father’s, but then I am not the fond parent of an only 
daughter. And I had sufficient faith in Dulcie’s affec- 
tion for her brother to believe that she wouldn’t take 
any serious step without first consulting that natural 
adviser. If a girl can’t be trusted to play tennis with 
a man without building up romance around him, espe- 
cially when that man is only the possessor of an 
income of £ioo a year, and wears gray trousers with 
white stripes down them, she isn’t fit to be allowed 
outside the walls of the county asylum. So I told 
my father when he hinted his fears of a clerical son-in- 
law. All the same, it seemed a wise thing to bring 
another Richmond into the field, and, running over 
the list of possibles and probables, I suddenly called 
to mind Steward, tied to his pen and office, shocking 
callers upon editorial business by the freedom of his 
language, and the limitations of his costume, conduct- 
ing half a dozen conversations on the telephone simul- 
taneously, and contriving to keep a cool head and 
clear brain in defiance of the thermometer and his 
manifold duties. Steward, it is true, could hardly be 
looked upon in any sense as a potential relative, but 
I knew no one who could supply so powerful a coun- 


SEPTEMBER 


^49 


ter-irritant to the poison of the curate’s fascination — 
if fascination there was — by his compelling charm of 
manner. Any person of sense would prefer half an 
hour of Steward to half a year of the Rev. Sturgis. 
I consulted the powers that be, dispatched a perspir- 
ing page boy with a telegram, and brought the jour- 
nalist safe and sound to our front door at 4 P. M. on 
Saturday. 

None of my people had ever met the man before — 
or anybody like him, but there is this sovereign fact 
about my Fleet Street friend, that though a person of 
no perception may begin by forming a poor opinion of 
him on account of his shaggy hair, insignificant figure, 
and aberrations of dress, which, on the present occa- 
sion, took the form of a gray felt sombrero and white 
“ ducks,” no one ever labors for any length of time 
under that erroneous impression. Steward, moreover, 
knows his own limitations to a nicety, and confines 
himself to those spheres of action in which he can 
shine. Therefore he declined Dulcie’s invitation to 
tennis, and let the Reverend Sturgis grovel in the 
bushes in search of lost balls. The exertion involved 
in this task may have reacted on the latter’s temper, 
or perhaps he may have discerned a rival, for he 
adopted a patronizing manner at the tea table toward 
his original-looking neighbor, and the sarcasm of the 
question he addressed to Steward was apparent to 
every one. 

“I suppose you don’t often get into the country? ” 

“ Not as often as I could wish,” replied Steward. 

‘‘ Ah, that’s a pity,” remarked Sturgis, idly tapping 
his saucer with his spoon, and with one eye on Dulcie 
to note the effect on her. ‘‘One has time really to 
study one’s fellow-creatures here, and, with all due 


S50 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


deference, that is what you gentlemen of the Press 
never seem to do.” 

The intonation given to the words expressed infinite 
comprehension, and infinite pity on the part of the 
speaker. 

‘‘ Really,” said Steward. “ Do you find humanity a 
profitable field for your investigation ? ” 

“ Profitable indeed,” exclaimed the other, delighted 
at the opportunity for delivering impromptu the sub- 
ject matter for a sermon he had in contemplation. “ To 
him who reverences the truth, and has the power to 
perceive it, nothing is common or unclean.” 

“ My great cause for complaint against the clergy,” 
interrupted the journalist, addressing nobody in par- 
ticular, but so emphasizing his statement that we all 
paused in our various acts of refreshment to listen, 
‘‘is that they can’t even bless mankind without put- 
ting on full vestments to pronounce the benediction. 
Many of us laymen ” — here Steward spoke directly to 
the curate, who was trying to shield himself behind his 
teacup, — “ from our knowledge of life have small 
reason to receive the message of a self-satisfied Church 
in a thankful spirit, and we decline to receive it at all 
unless it is spoken by a man.*' 

After which the clerical gentleman subsided to his 
proper conversational level, to the huge delight of my 
father, and with the tacit approval of Dulcie, whose 
fairness of judgment recognized the justice of the re- 
buke. Never were the old women of the village so 
well served by their minister as during the rest of 
Steward’s stay at the place. 

No guest could be easier to entertain than the jour- 
nalist, possessed as he is of the resources of a lively 
and many-sided intellect, for were it only a walk round 


SEPTEMBER 


2^1 


the stables, he would invest the proceedings with 
interest by a fund of information on such a topic as 
that great sire of our thoroughbred stock, Eclipse. 
My mother was charmed by her guest’s solicitude, 
which never obtruded, was always present, and 
Dulcie’s heart was completely won by the sympathy 
and insight with which he discoursed on the care and 
management of the affections at a moment when advice 
on that subject was peculiarly opportune. Our house- 
hold being one in which ceremony is conspicuous by 
its absence, Steward was at liberty to follow his own 
bent during the two days he spent in it. He was 
content to lie out on the lawns, under the limes and 
elms, feed the goldfish in the fountain, modeled on 
the famous basin at Versailles, smoke Havana after 
Havana, and steal from Time a few uncounted hours 
of reverie. The flow of witty and shrewd speech he 
was ready to indulge in for our entertainment revealed 
to my people the possibilities of the English language 
and the human intelligence, while Steward, on his 
part, professed himself eternally grateful to me for 
permitting him to see the country, and existence 
generally, under novel conditions. But I was more 
than repaid for any hospitality I had offered by my 
friend’s defense of the Artist and Bohemian against 
the attacks of the Philistine — represented by my father, 
who stirred up the discussion on the Sunday night 
over our coffee and cigars when we were sitting under 
the rising orb of a very golden harvest moon. 

My father had been rash enough — rash, that is, from 
his own point of view — to express a hope that Steward, 
wise with the experience of a lifetime in the ways of 
literary Bohemia, would dissuade his only son from 
profitless excursions into that dry and thirsty land, 


252 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


when he had, m the interests of his own future as a 
landed proprietor, far better confine his energies to 
acquiring the taste for country institutions which land- 
owning demands. Out of deference to his guest my 
father refrained from imparting direct his views on 
journalism and authors, but the guest quickly divined 
them. 

‘‘Why shouldn’t a man,” said Steward at length, 
“who has talent in the direction you indicate, Mr. 
Hanbury, — and your son has talent, — make the best 
use of it ? Haven’t we need for pens as well as plow- 
shares ? ” 

“Other men,” rejoined my father, “not so fortu- 
nately placed as Gerald can tempt Providence in Fleet 
Street. He, at any rate, has no need to do so.” 

“ Need ! ” echoed the other with an inflection of 
scorn. “ It’s not a question of ‘ need ’ ; it’s a question 
of ‘ must,’ for body and soul to obey the mysterious 
force impelling them. Your son and I, sir, have 
heard the song of the sirens, with ears unstopped by 
the wax of the worldly Ulysses, and we must ‘see 
visions and dream dreams,’ appraising men and things 
by other standards than those of accepted success, to, 
perhaps, find poverty and failure at the end of all. 
Yet we would prefer the fate of the genius Chatterton 
dying of starvation at the age of twenty on a pallet 
of straw to that of the monarch in his palace praised 
by all men. The stars have called to us and we must 
hearken.” 

“The stars?” asked my mother, who takes words 
literally. 

“Literary ambition, the spirit of Romance, Bohe- 
mia,” explained Steward, with a wealth of correction. 

A sigh escaped from Dulcie, who was gazing at the 


SEPTEMBER 


253 


journalist with an expression of concentrated fascina- 
tion that spoke volumes for his magnetic eloquence. 

‘‘Are you sure you are not catching cold, dear?” 
said my mother, who would have similarly interrupted 
the recital of a death sentence at the Old Bailey, so 
little regard had she for the solemnities. Dulcie gave 
a protesting shake of her shoulders, but never took her 
eyes off Steward, who had resumed his brief for the 
defense. 

“ When I was a youth carrying copy to the printer 
on a salary of ten shillings a week, I wouldn't have 
sold a single one of my ideals for all the luxury you 
could have heaped on me. And every year I cling 
still more passionately to the ambitions and hopes, 
unsubstantial, no doubt, clustering within me. You 
only note, Mr. Hanbury, the outward differences be- 
tween myself and your friends, the unconventionalities 
of my appearance ” — my father’s deprecating hand 
was ignored — “ my irreverence toward the code of 
life you obey, my disregard of the accepted laws of 
moneymaking. But you have no knowledge of the 
sources from which I draw a joie de vivve, an enthu- 
siasm which makes your comfortable existence in 
comparison the shadow of a shade, bloodless and 
empty. Why, sitting in this garden, surrounded by 
the dim forms of trees, and under the vast canopy of 
the heavens, my pulses are tingling with the sum- 
mons of the eternal spirit of youth — the Andromache 
of the ages — bidding me rescue it from the clutches 
of the Conventions! The Romance of the world is 
a prisoner in the grasp of the ideas you stand for. 
Instinctively you don’t want your son to join me, and 
the uncouth tribe to which I belong, in the warfare we 
wage against those ideas. But he will, sir, in spite of 


254i 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


everything you can urge. He has eaten our salt, and 
his name is enrolled in our fellowship.’’ 

My father’s cigar glowed crimson in the darkness 
as he pulled at it in dawning comprehension of the 
faith Steward was enunciating. But it was my mother 
who took up the challenge. 

“We don’t like Gerald,” she said, “spending so 
much time writing articles in London, when he ought 
to be either working at the Bar or getting known to 
our tenants. Besides, ideas such as you hold prevent 
any one settling down to the responsibilities of life, 
like marriage.” 

“ My dear madam,” deferentially replied Steward, 
“ the responsibilities of life are not kept at bay by the 
possession of one set of ideas rather than another. 
The child in each of us grows old despite any creed 
one may possess ; but while this man only knows that 
all things decay, that man sees the roses on the tomb, 
and the life springing from the dust. To your hus- 
band details are the most important thing — the rota- 
tion of crops, the head of game, the weekly investment 
list. To me the years are too precious to be squan- 
dered on matters which others will accomplish on my 
behalf for a salary. In the cave of Aladdin I refuse 
to concern myself with the sacks in which the treasure 
lies hid. I want the treasure itself — and life is the 
most wonderful treasure imaginable ! ” 

Steward threw up his arms with a gesture of despair, 
as though language failed to describe what he found 
in life. 

“ Life!” 

The word came from Dulcie in a whisper, vibrant 
with emotion. She crouched in her chair, her figure 
rigid, her whole soul responding in an ecstasy that 


SEPTEMBER 


255 


was agony to tHe gospel preached to her for the first 
time. In that moment to her awakening intelligence 
Steward was neither old nor young, handsome nor 
plain. He was immortal youth, that incarnate spirit 
of nature whom the ancients called Pan, bidding her 
obey her own instincts and not those of other people, 
and to have done with the anxieties and cares with 
which civilization fetters the race. As if aware of the 
effect he was producing on at least one of his audience, 
and anxious to bring the conversation down to earth 
before it soared beyond control. Steward did not take 
up the thread where he had dropped it. 

*‘My belief,’' he went on, ‘Ms purely personal. I 
would never try to inoculate another person with it; 
and, besides, Gerald has an inheritance to transmit, 
and a name to perpetuate. But he won’t make the 
worst husband because he has looked on the glory of 
the world rather than its shadows, and because the 
goddess of Romance has touched him with the hem 
of her robe. Whoever has sought beauty and found 
it, him shall ye reckon happy ! ” 

The voice of the speaker died away like the murmur 
of the night wind among pines. We sat motionless 
as the stone figures one may chance on in the neg- 
lected pleasance of a deserted chateau. My father’s 
bowed head rested on his hands, my mother wore an 
expression of puzzled awe, while Dulcie, with wide- 
opened eyes, sought the illimitable spaces of dream- 
land. As for me. Steward’s inspired rhapsody was a 
thing of joy to raise and purify me of earthly long- 
ings. I could have sat for eons in that garden, build- 
ing castles in the air out of the outlines of the trees 
ragged against the disk of the moon. But the hour 
of ecstasy passes like the rest, and my mother broke 


256 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


up the group from that sense of disciplinary solicitude 
which marks the correct hostess. The pressure of my 
father’s hand, as he gave me a more than usually cor- 
dial grip at parting outside our bedroom doors, showed 
me, however, that Steward’s message had been inter- 
preted aright. 

Now the question with my people is, “ When will 
that delightful Mr. Steward come to visit us again?” 

When the harvest moon sails again in the sky ! ” 
I make reply. One Bohemian is quite enough in the 
family. 

Mr. Thurston’s lodge in Rosshire stands in a plan- 
tation of young spruce firs at the head of a wild glen, 
with a river flashing three hundred feet below. In 
fine weather a wonderful panorama stretches before 
the spectator standing at the lodge door, for straight 
across the gorge rises Ben Machree in rugged gran- 
deur, its broad outline broken into spurs and shoulders 
where the rocky flanks protrude through their thin 
covering of heather. The gray desolation of the great 

corrie ” on the face of the mountain opposite, within 
which lies the sanctuary for the forest, the bright 
streak of a waterfall on the sheer precipice forming 
its right-hand wall, the purple radiance of the heather- 
clad slopes of low ground, the gleam of distant waters, 
the light and shade chasing alternately across moun- 
tain and glen, the herds of red deer to be spied with 
no more exertion than is involved in focusing a stalk- 
ing-glass, the golden eagles circling in search of blue 
hares — make up a prospect to be found nowhere save 
in the Highlands of Scotland. Even when the storms 
hide Ben Machree in a winding sheet of vapor, the 
mist pours down the valley like an army of phantoms, 


SEPTEMBER 


257 


and the rain lashes in fury the windows of the lodge, 
there is an awe that is a fascination in nature veiling 
her face in a white mask, and the uproar accompany- 
ing the transformation. Wealth can be put to no 
better use than to buy a man foothold in such sur- 
roundings as those of Ben Machree Lodge. 

Inside, the place is much the same as all its kind — 
severely simple in its appointments, the walls lined 
with match-boarding, the carpets and curtains of Cam- 
eron tartan, antlers and heads everywhere. The chief 
feature is the veranda running round two sides of 
the lodge, screened with glass from the uncertain 
climate of the ‘‘north countree” — the receptacle for 
rods, lines, cardboard targets, and all the varied tackle 
of the chase, the chosen spot for the display of the 
salmon, the baskets of trout, the “ bags ” of grouse and 
ptarmigan, at the close of each day^s sport, the in- 
formal smoking-room of the men at all hours, the 
rendezvous of the ladies after dinner, where they can 
listen to the recital of the incidents of stalking and fish- 
ing from the principal performers. The regime is 
Spartan, no culinary refinements being possible, since 
supplies are three days’ distant, and any meat, save 
mountain-fed mutton and venison, unprocurable. For 
drink there is whisky, and plenty of it. The whole 
domestic economy of Ben Machree Lodge, in fact, is 
regulated by, and subordinated to, the interests of 
sport. Mr. Thurston will not tolerate the intrusion 
of Mayfair manners, and Park Lane pirouettings, such 
as are the fashion on Speyside, Deeside, and other 
Scottish haunts of society. Lady Susan has to leave 
her ball dresses and tiara in the south, champagne and 
other “kickshaws,” in the language of the host, are 
strictly barred, and woe betide the guest who lags 


258 


TOO MANY WOMEN. 


behind in the house after 9.30 A. m., or stays up when 
the order for ‘‘ lights out ” has been given at 1 1 p. m. 
He, or she, is never given another chance of shooting 
a “ royal ’’ in Gabrach Corrie, or hooking a fresh-run 
grilse by the sunken rock in the King’s Pool. So 
long as the light is right for spying, two rifles have 
to be out day by day with Donald and Hector on one 
or the other of the beats of the forest, there are rods 
wanted on river and hill-loch, and if a gun can be 
spared to walk up grouse on the low ground, so much 
the better for the larder, and the peace of mind of 
Lady Susan and her cook. Catering in the wilderness 
for a house party of eight, ten servants, and a horde of 
attendant ghillies and stalkers, is not a task to be 
undertaken without the assistance of good men and 
true to walk anywhere from ten to twenty-five miles 
a day and bring in spoils varying from a stag of six- 
teen stone to a jacksnipe. 

With the air blowing keen off the hills, the atmos- 
phere so clear that one can make out a raven perched 
on a rock at a mile, the towering majesty of Ben 
Machree, its lofty head crowned with a shifting cap 
of fleecy cloud, the impressive silence of the ‘‘ corries ” 
wrapped in “the sleep that is amongst the lonely 
hills,” the sight of the stalking pony picking its way 
carefully up the steep track to the spot where it will 
wait till the faint echo of the rifle shall summon it to 
bring home the monarch of the glen, the bracing of 
every muscle, and the tingling of every nerve, as the 
glass is turned on a shootable stag, and one enters on 
the test of endurance and skill which may last half 
an hour, or half a day, before one can crawl into 
range of the animal — with these sensations to put on 
the credit side of the account, Scotland indeed makes 


SEPTEMBER 


259 


one her debtor. I should have had the time of my 
life at the Thurstons’ even if the Lodge had been full 
of “ ticket-of-leave ” men and suffragettes. As it was, 
I found myself in a party comprised of Massey, a 
captain fellow in the H.L.I. from Fort George, a 
girl whom nobody takes much notice of in London 
because she is plain and dances outrageously, but who 
was in her element at Ben Machree, and caught more 
fish than the rest of the party put together, and, above 
all, Audrey Maitland, who, if she had been fascinating 
in the patchouli-laden atmosphere of the Steins, was 
now ravishing in a tam-o’shanter, and a broad sash 
of her clan tartan across her evening frock. Bonnie 
Mary of Argyll wasn’t in it with Audrey for all that 
makes for the conquest of my sex. 

Love-making, however, took a back place in the 
twelve days of my stay in Rosshire, and had I wanted 
to play the Romeo, I should have found it difficult, 
for a Highland lodge does not encourage tete-a-tetes, 
unless one is indifferent as to who overhears that 
speech signifying that another mortal has been 
sentenced at Cupid’s court-martial. Moreover, the 
will was wanting. To start off less than an hour after 
breakfast in any weather, trudge up hill and down 
dale behind a stalker who rivals the walking powers of 
Miss Kilmansegg and her golden leg, to crawl up 
drains, and lie in peat hags, crouch behind a stone on 
the mountain top in the teeth of a howling gale for 
two hours, and then run a mile at top speed because 
the deer have shifted, sprawl down an exposed face an 
inch at a time in full view of the hinds below, and, if 
one is in luck, get home at 7 p. m., after an eight-mile 
walk with the pony only ‘‘bogging” once — such 
things are conducive to thoughts of bed rather than 


260 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


tender sentiments. To complete the rout of romance, 
Duncan Cameron skirled his pipes round and round 
the dinner table during dessert, this stimulating enter- 
tainment being followed by reels in the skinning-room 
of the deer larder, to the light of candles stuck on to 
the beams from which the deer were slung, and in the 
presence of an audience of ghillies, who followed suit 
themselves as soon as the “gentry” had had their 
fling and withdrawn to the seclusion of the veranda 
and bridge. 

People never do themselves justice in London, 
where the feverish anxiety to have a good time, and 
be “in the swim” at all costs, produces an effect of 
insincerity and heartlessness. Lady Susan, pouring 
out coffee at breakfast or cutting sandwiches, was the 
British Matron sans peur et sans reproche, rather 
than the society grande dame, occupied in preserv- 
ing social distinctions for her caste, and in saving her 
daughter from the attentions of ineligibles. Dolly, 
struggling to cast a straight line with an eighteen-foot 
salmon rod, was no longer the Porcelain Princess of 
Charles Street, Berkeley Square. And Clive Massey 
became a far more presentable figure in Harris tweeds, 
getting a right and left at grouse, or stopping a black- 
cock at forty yards, than when hanging around ac- 
tresses. As for myself, the world was well lost for 
the boisterous health and spirits that filled me from 
the moment I jumped into an icy-cold bath, to the 
time when, sixteen hours later, I thrust my tired 
limbs into pink pyjamas. 

The first days of my visit coincided with a heavy 
“ spate,” so I turned my attention to the river, wading 
about in the brown flood, a watchful ghillie at my 
back ready to gaff my belt if my feet slipped on the 


SEPTEMBER 


261 


uneven bed, and one of the ladies on the bank to take 
a turn in whipping the most likely pools, and shout 
advice, above the roaring of the waters, when a grilse 
had succumbed to the lure of the “ Silver Doctor,’^ 
and was bending the “ greenheart ” double in wild 
rushes for freedom. As soon as the river fell, the 
H.L.I. fellow and myself put in one good spell after 
ptarmigan and grouse on the tops of a range of hills 
where, the feeding not being so much to the taste of 
the deer as that on Ben Machree, we did not disturb 
the stalking. The three girls accompanying us, we 
walked the seven miles in line, picking up in the three 
hours of the journey grouse, hares, and snipe till the 
panniers of the pony were as full as an inspector of 
the R.S.P.C.A. would have permitted before institut- 
ing a prosecution. After a stiff scramble we lunched 
on the summit, in a wilderness of gray shingle and 
rocks, looking the while from Skye to Cromarty. 
Then, the party dividing into two, there ensued a con- 
fused game of ‘‘ I spy over the various peaks and 
gullies of the range, much banging at the flocks of 
ptarmigan, which walked at one's feet like pigeons 
till roused to fly by volleys of stones, an infringement 
by the Captain of the Wild Birds Protection Act 
(Scotland) in securing a peregrine falcon, and a hulla- 
balloo after a fox, shot by myself, who, having got 
separated from the rest in pursuit of a wounded hare, 
surprised Reynard as he made for his den in a rocky 
cairn. We arrived home in triumph with fifteen brace 
of ptarmigan, twelve brace of grouse, a couple of 
snipe, five hares, a fox and a peregrine, having drunk 
all the streams dry on our homeward way, the ladies 
footsore, the dogs limping, and a universal sensation 
of having eaten nothing for twelve hours, or tasted 


^62 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


whisky for twenty-four. If any other place than 
Scotland can give an equal meed of pleasure and pain 
I’d like to know of it. 

My first day on the hill/’ as the phrase goes, was 
unfortunate. After Hector had given me a long crawl 
over broken ground, a hind, which had been lying 
unperceived in the shelter of a peat bog, suddenly got 
our wind and gave the alarm to the beast we were 
stalking. Later on we sighted a nice stag lying in a 

pocket” on the far side of the ground, but as the 
wind blew over the top on both sides, the only ap- 
proach was from the “ corrie ” below, where the 
ground was too bare to permit of our remaining un- 
seen by the quarry. It was want of tact that led 
Hector, after our luckless day, to expatiate on the 
grand heads he had stalked on this selfsame beat. I 
did manage to shoot an animal the next time I went 
out on the lower ground, seventeen stone, but a 
‘‘ switch,” so I was still without the trophy I longed 
for when it was my turn again to scale Ben Machree. 
Of course it was a misty morning on the mountain, 
and, as the chances of getting anything except a chill 
seemed remote, I suggested to Audrey Maitland that 
she should put on a “ sou’-wester ” hat and a water- 
proof skirt and join me. Lady Susan made some 
demur, but Mr. Thurston shouted out, “ A good wet- 
ting hurts nobody, and makes the hair curl,” and 
drove the girl forth. 

When we set out things were not so bad, but as we 
rose higher and higher up Ben Machree, in a silent 
line of men and ponies, the mist grew denser, until 
all sounds became muffled in the oppressive folds of 
vapor. Once we heard the half cough, half grunt 
of a startled hind, and the clatter of the stones as she 


SEPTEjMBER 


263 


galloped away along a precipitous track, but for the 
most part we moved in a dead world. At rare inter- 
vals a freshening gust of air would roll away the bank 
of fog like a curtain to disclose, far away, glimpses of 
loch and moorland and mountain-side glowing a vivid 
green and purple in the damp atmosphere, and mur- 
murous with the voices of the burns hurling them- 
selves down the heather cliffs on which we stood. 

The pinnacle of Ben Machree is formed of a shat- 
tered pile of granite over a hundred feet in height, its 
base surrounded by huge boulders, torn from the 
parent block in prehistoric ages, and heaped in all 
directions for scores of yards. A long, natural stair- 
case of rock leads up through the center of the mass 
to a deep depression at the top, from which it is cus- 
tomary to spy the whole range of the peak, and 
Gabrach Corrie itself, a vast amphitheater directly 
below in the heart of the mountain, always full of deer 
for the reasons that the grass is sweet and the wind, 
sucked up through the corrie as in a funnel, blows 
from all quarters of the compass upon the deer and 
protects them effectually from danger. Already that 
season. Hector, so he said, had abandoned half a 
dozen stalks there after very heavy animals, owing to , 
the treacherous nature of the air currents. While 
the pony was relieved of the deer saddle and hobbled, 
Audrey, I, and the ghillie with the rifle, climbed to the 
crest of the rock to await events, the stalker going off 
to discover if there was any clearer view to be obtained 
lower down the hill. For what seemed an intermi- 
nable time we sat there, marooned in a sea of mist, cut 
off from earth as completely as though in a balloon 
trying to pierce the veil which hung before us for 
sight or sound of man or beast or good red earth. 


264j too many women 

We had given up all hope of a stalk when, with the 
unexpectedness of an actor appearing through a trap 
door on to the stage, Hector stood beside us. 

''There’s a gran’ beast in yon corrie,” he whis- 
pered. " I’m no saying he’s not a royal, but, mon, 
he’s in a verra awkward poseetion with the puffs 
coming every way. I spied him through a chink in 
the mist. It’ll be clearing the noo, I think.” 

As he said it, the wall of vapor broke, outlines of 
rock appeared on every hand, and we saw the mist 
swirling over the sides of Gabrach Corrie, as though 
from a gigantic punch bowl filled with the devil’s 
brew. Far, far below came into view the little loch 
at the bottom', and the jagged pinnacles ribbing the 
steep descent. Sounds of life penetrated once more 
to the ear, the hoarse croak of a raven, the pony crop- 
ping grass at the foot of our crag, and the wail of the 
rising wind as it commenced its sad symphony round 
the bleak buttresses of stone. I turned my glass on to 
the depths, and the deer we had been seeking leaped 
into being on its powerful lens, a herd of hinds feeding 
along the loch shore, and scattered groups of stags, 
their points left to conjecture, so distant were they. 
We lost no time in descending from our eminence, 
and consigning Audrey to a vigil with the pony. 
Hector took the rifle, and crept forward to the edge 
of the abyss, with myself in pursuit. When the pillar 
crest of Ben Machree was out of sight above, the 
stalker stopped behind a projecting boulder, wriggled 
on to his elbow and gazed long and earnestly down 
the slope, here set at an angle of fifty degrees. When 
it came my turn to look I seemed to be in the 
middle of all the deer in the country, for on that day 
Gabrach Corrie held at least fifty fine stags, and a 


SEPTEMBER 


S65 


couple of hundred hinds, some lying in pockets and 
holes on the steep face opposite, some feeding on the 
young grass for which the “corrie’' was famous, 
others walking to “ fresh fields and pastures new/’ 

*‘To your right!” hissed Hector, and, as I fol- 
lowed his direction, there came into view a magnificent 
stag, its three companions all ordinarily worth a shot, 
but now completely eclipsed by an animal of eleven 
points, and at least eighteen stone. The quartet lay 
about five hundred yards below and to the right on a 
carpet of thick heather, interspersed with granite frag- 
ments. To reach them would involve crossing a dry 
water course and an exposed tract of rubble and grass 
before the shelter of a rocky spur could be attained. 
Even then it was doubtful, so far as we could make 
out from where we crouched, whether a shot could be 
effected without the head and shoulders of the sports- 
man being visible on the sky-line. But the problem 
could wait, the immediate question being how to get 
as far. For though we might hope to escape the 
notice of the particular beasts we were stalking, the 
“ corrie ” was so full of deer that it would be strange 
if we deceived them all. 

But chance helped us. We lay on the lip of an 
enormous cup, of which the side farthest from us had 
been bitten out, and at the base of this gash a pass 
led down to a wood, the top of which was just visible. 
Up this pass, about a mile and a half from us, a great 
concourse of deer was ascending, every stag and hind 
in the “ corrie ” becoming intent on this proceeding, 
with heads raised from the ground, and turned to the 
newcomers. In the diversion so created, we threw 
ourselves on our faces, and never raising a limb from 
the ground, but progressing as an animated pancake 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


might be expected to do, we reached the stream bed, 
took a moment’s breathing space, and crossed the 
danger zone an inch at a time, until we halted behind 
the projecting ridge. My hopes of a rest were dis- 
appointed, for Hector started forthwith headforemost 
downhill, and as he had the rifle, the glass and the 
flask, I had perforce to follow. When we did come to 
a standstill, with our heels high above our heads, and 
the contents of my pockets emptying themselves 
generously over the heather, I lay with my tongue 
out and my brain swimming, wondering whether my 
insurance premiums were all paid up, and whom I 
should bequeath my signet ring to — Audrey, or 
Cynthia. I was roused to inspect the stags through 
a convenient crack, where they lay not 120 yards off, 
my beast on the extreme left, with its head laid along- 
side its body, dozing. To wait in a cramped position, 
tortured with needles and pins, a desire to sneeze, and 
a burning thirst, one’s pipe pressing into one’s side, 
the rifle crushing one’s thigh, the blood rushing into 
one’s head, and grim expectancy clutching at one’s 
heart — to endure these pangs until it should please 
the stag to get on its legs and offer the chance of a 
shot to trembling fingers and blurred brain, was to 
display qualities deserving canonization on the spot. 
I would rather have gone back to Audrey and Dewar’s 
‘‘ Fine Blend,” than have taken Quebec or shot the 
‘‘ eleven-pointer.” As a matter of fact I did none of 
these things, for when, after a full hour and a half’s 
wait, the beast rose and began to feed, I was so ex- 
hausted, and my hand so unsteady that I sighted too 
high, or too low, or too much in front, and, instead of 
falling to the report, the stag stared for a moment in 
sheer surprise at the unwelcome entree to its dinner, 


SEPTEMBER 


267 

before stampeding up the corrie ” over its far brow, 
together with every animal in the place. 

‘‘ Better luck next time,” gasped Hector, as we 
toiled back to the cairn ; but ye pulled off too soon. 
It’s no so late, though. We’ll have something the 
day.” 

I put the speaker’s cheerfulness down to the innate 
politeness of the Highlander, and accepted Audrey’s 
sympathy with gloom, not even lightened by her 
account of instructing the ghillie in the mysteries of 
‘‘ Cat’s Cradle,” and we proceeded along the ridge of 
the mountain in the direction in which the deer had 
gone, spying some of the hinds feeding peacefully on 
the flats below, but of a stag, and particularly our 
stag, not a trace. Hector meanwhile took all the 
precautions which a stalker loves to indulge in. He 
threw up tufts of cotton grass, with which his waist- 
coat pocket was stuffed, to test the direction of the 
wind, never suffered us to turn a corner or descend 
a gully till he had searched the foreground with his 
glass, chose his path so as to avoid loose stones, and 
called a halt for ten minutes after sending a ptarmigan 
wheeling over the sky-line. As we approached the 
end of the center ridge Hector redoubled his stealth, 
till he disconcerted Audrey and myself by throwing 
himself full length on the ground. Our nerves 
thoroughly unstrung by the maneuver, we followed 
suit. And it was well we did, for between the blades 
of mountain grass, which formed our temporary 
horizon, we saw the three companion stags to the one 
I had missed walking along a plateau which broke the 
declivity of Ben Machree some ninety yards below. 
The sight was so unexpected that I let them vanish 
in the distance before stretching for the rifle. Putting 


m 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


his fing-er to his lips, Hector drew the Mannlicher 
from its canvas case and slipped it into my hands, 
just as there appeared before us the stag we sought, 
carrying its head and branching antlers proudly, and 
quickening its pace to overtake its comrades. My 
head cleared, I raised the rifle softly, as it came level, 
aimed at the line of its shaggy neck, and shot it 
through the heart. At 5 p. m. exactly my foot was 
on its broad flanks and I drank “ Blood on the knife,” 
Hector replying in the toast of “ More blood.” It 
was nearly six before the stag was ‘‘ gralloched,” fixed 
on the pony, and our faces turned toward the lodge, 
nine miles away. 

Of that walk I cherish the pleasantest recollec- 
tions, for, having got the finest head so far killed that 
season on the forest, I was tramping alongside 
Audrey, helping her over rough places, listening to 
her gay chatter, and generally reveling in her prox- 
imity. What matter, then, the mischances that befell 
us, the mist coming down again at nightfall, the 
lantern’s refusal to throw a proper light on the rough 
track, the pony ‘‘bogging” twice and having to be 
relieved of its load and hauled out by main force, my 
disappearance into a deep heather hole with a foot of 
water at the bottom, Audrey’s mishap as she crossed 
the river, slipping backward off a precipitous bank up 
to her waist, and at the end Lady Susan’s reprimand 
to me for taking so little care of the girl ! 

“ Hang the girl, he’s got the stag ! ” said Mr. 
Thurston. 

“ He’s got ’em both,” added Massey when Miss 
Maitland and her hostess were out of hearing. As, 
in my soaking clothes, I was in no mood for repartee, 
I let that statement pass. Anyhow, wherever the lady 


SEPTEMBER m 

may find a billet, the head’s going over my writing 
table. 

When, on my return south, George Burn wrote and 
asked me to join Archie Haines and himself for ten 
days at Dieppe, my first impulse was to refuse to link 
my fortune to any such combination of high living 
and plain thinking. But it is a poor comradeship 
which only shows itself in times of calm, so I accepted, 
if only to save George and Archie from their worse 
selves, since I could afford to view their masculine 
shortcomings with an aloofness due to my wandering 
affections having become fixed at last. My misgiv- 
ings were revived with full force upon George’s ap- 
pearing at Victoria Station in a large check ulster, the 
pockets stuffed with French novels and contraband 
tobacco, on his head a Homburg hat ornamented with 
a bunch of feathers, his luggage consisting of a dis- 
reputable kit-bag and a hold-all,” and that expres- 
sion of rollicking bravado on his face which the Briton 
assumes to convey his anticipatory enjoyment of the 
pleasures of ‘‘Gay Paree.” We crossed from New- 
haven on a sea so smooth that a sailor’s life appeared 
the most enviable of all, George striking a note of 
sincerity in his confession of regret that he was not 
in the Navy, by saying that he liked the “ wife in every 
port” idea. The Hotel des Bains had been recom- 
mended to Haines as possessing all the comforts of 
home with none of its rigors, so we took up our resi- 
dence there for the period of our stay in the French 
watering place. 

Why is it that the mere fact of being on the Con- 
tinent makes the average Englishman feel that he is 
the very devil of a fellow, up to no end of mischief? 


2T0 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


The three of us sat in the Casino, and laughed at the 
fathers of families who were taking a week-end away 
from the counters and desks where they earned the 
salaries to pay the rents of Balham and Tooting, pre- 
tending that they liked to strain absinthe through a 
lump of sugar, and casting glances right and left with 
the intention of conveying to the ladies that they were 
regular Don Juans. The folk who had landed from 
the cross-channel steamer, typical middle-class Britons, 
shy and reserved, were in two hours transformed, 
under the influence of the Gallic climate, into gay 
Lotharios out on the spree, ready to fling their francs 
on the “boule” tables and to offer light refresh- 
ments to the butterflies of pleasure who, in silks and 
satins, had fluttered into the gilded saloons of the 
Casino. Wherever we went — to the cafes of the 
Grande Rue Henri IV, to the Castle on the West 
Cliffs, to the forest of Arques, to the restaurant at 
Puys, we were dogged by our fellow-countrymen 
reveling in the new-found sense of freedom which 
comes with exile from their own convention-ridden 
land. They lined the morning promenade on La 
Plage, they sat on the beach at the bathing hour, 
when the native beauty of Dieppe took its plunge into 
the “briny,” clad in rainbow-colored toilettes, com- 
plete with stockings and buckled shoes, and with the 
Avearer’s monogram worked on the right hip, and 
they were on the spot in smoking jackets and opera 
hats when the band commenced the evening’s gayety 
sharp at nine by striking up -'Non, je ne marche 
pas.’* 

After four or five days, however, George wanted 
something more exciting than studying the genus 
“ tourist” 


SEPTEMBER 


£71 


I didn’t come over here to behave as though I 
was at Margate,” he announced at last. “ If you fel- 
lows like to spend your time twiddling your thumbs 
on the beach while a sweet thing in violet skips about 
in front trying to avoid wetting her feet, I don’t, so 
I’m off on my own account.” 

‘‘ Going off on his own account ” didn’t improve 
George as a companion, but it seemed to work won- 
ders on his spirits. We only saw him at long inter- 
vals, when he threw out dark hints about assignations, 
and ‘‘the time of his life,” and borrowed lOO-franc 
notes of us. We caught a glimpse of him one night 
on the terrace of the Casino talking to a prepossessing 
female in black picked out with orange sequins, but 
it was only a glimpse, and as George is very English, 
with linguistic powers to match, and his companion 
looked very French, Haines and I concluded that the 
conversation was pretty much on the surface. 

“ Making an ass of himself with some woman,” said 
Haines, and I agreed; but when George began to 
take all his meals out, and practically never showed 
up for forty-eight hours, our sense of amusement 
changed to one of annoyance, since Haines and I were 
too much alike in temperament, and we needed George 
as a buffer. 

On the sixth day of our visit we two were sitting 
outside our hotel after dejeuner, basking in the sun, 
when a Frenchman came up from the Plage. His 
heavy mustache and “ imperial,” his black cut-away 
coat and dark trousers made him appear a painful 
object in the heat, and the excitement which caused 
him to wave his cane at sight of us taking our ease 
was, in our opinion, solely attributable to his suffer- 
ings. To our astonishment, as he came level with our 


272 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


chairs he stopped to scrutinize us, rolling his eyes 
about meantime, and muttering “ Sacre bleus,’' and 
other expletives, for his own edification rather than 
ours. 

“You are ze Monsieur Anglais?” he asked 
abruptly, in an execrable accent, looking from Haines 
to myself, and back again to see which claimed the 
honor. 

“ Of course we’re English,” said Haines. “ Do we 
look like Japs?” 

The Frenchman’s further examination was not to 
his apparent satisfaction. 

“You are not ze Monsieur!” he remarked, with a 
shrug, and pulling at his imperial with a perplexed 
gesture. 

“Why did you say we were, then?” demanded 
Haines aggressively. 

“ Don’t worry the fellow with your lingo,” I inter- 
posed. “ He doesn’t understand a word of it, and 
he’s got something on his mind.” 

“Ze Monsieur avec le chapeau, vere ees ee?” and 
our strange visitor put his hand up to the side of his 
head and waggled his fingers in his endeavor to ex- 
press the bunch of feathers which distinguished 
George’s hat from all others. 

“ My goodness ! ” I shouted at Haines. “ He means 
George. I don’t like the looks of this.” 

“Jove, you’re right,” and Haines slapped his knee 
to emphasize the force of his discovery. 

The Frenchman put the right interpretation on our 
excitement. “ Le connaissez-vous ? ” he demanded. 
“ I veesh parler a leettle to Monsieur.” 

I tried my hand at diplomacy. 


SEPTEMBER 


^73 


'^Qu’est ce que vous voulez dire a Monsieur? 
Peut-etre pourrons-nous lui porter une lettre ? ’’ 

The man waved his arms about as though he was 
signaling. 

“Non, non, non!” and his voice rose an octave 
with each word. “ II est mechant, cet homme la. Ee 
ees vat you call ‘ a devil.’ He kees my vife, I kees 
’eem.” And the stick was flourished to the imminent 
danger of our heads. 

“ Oh, ga ne fait rien,” said Haines, using about the 
only French phrase he knew. In the circumstances 
it was an unfortunate one. 

“Vat you say? You tink it nossing to kees my 
vife ? ” shouted the outraged husband, growing purple 
in the face, and advancing toward Haines with his 
fist clenched. 

“ Ici ! ” and I got up to stop the fight that seemed 
imminent. “ Mon ami ne comprend pas qu’est ce 

qu’il dit Tell him you’re damned sorry,” I said 

to Haines in an aside. 

“ So I am, that I haven’t kissed his wife. Tell him 
that!” 

“ Monsieur me demande exprimer son regret com- 
plet,” I explained. “Understand? Comprenez?” 

“ All right.” The Frenchman’s passion subsided, 
with Gallic characteristicness, as quickly as it had 
risen. “ Mais votre ami ? ” he went on to ask. 

“II est sur la mer,” and Haines gesticulated to- 
ward the blue waters of the Channel. 

“ Sur la mer ? ” gasped our visitor, gazing spell- 
bound at the offending element for a minute before he 
could recover himself to say, “ ’Eem I ’ave seen dans 
le Casino hier au soir?” 


274 : 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


C’est vrais, old fellow/’ Haines continued, “ il est 
parti ce matin au travers la Manche avec la blanch- 
isseuse de Thotel — he has gone off with the washer- 
woman, hasn’t he?” Haines had the effrontery to 
appeal for my support. 

I began to stammer a reluctant affirmative, but I 
might have spared myself the falsehood. Aghast at 
the Don Juan proclivities of ‘‘ ze Engleeshman ” who 
could combine conquests over his wife and the 
‘‘ blanchisseuse ” of the Hotel des Bains, the Mossoo 
was defeated without my unveracious assistance, his 
fury extinguished in the excess of his astonishment. 

‘‘ Quel jetine homme! ” gasped the Frenchman, with 
a tragic intensity in which unwilling admiration was 
blended. To the heartfelt relief of Haines and my- 
self he made haste to beat a retreat down the path; 
finally vanishing from our sight on the Plage. 

We still had the elusive George on our souls, fear- 
ful lest a chance meeting between the rivals might 
lead to a melee, or, worse still, publicity. No sooner 
was the horizon clear of the husband and his ash- 
plant than we proceeded to make systematic search 
for the couple who were causing all the trouble, a 
task easier begun than carried to a successful con- 
clusion, since the town of Dieppe offers many secluded 
spots for those who think that two is company and 
three the very devil. In fact, the credit of ending 
it all belonged to Haines, who, guided by some clair- 
voyant instinct, insisted on tramping across three 
hundred yards of shingle in the burning sun to look 
behind a groyne which ran from the foot of the cliffs 
into the sea at the extreme point of the esplanade. 

“ Whoop, lass ! tear ’em, puppy, tear ’em ! ” 

Leaning over the breakwater, some four feet in 


SEPTEMBER 


S75 


height, Haines gave tongue in a note of triumph that 
brought me up at a trot. Sure enough, there was 
George, not the slightest sign of embarrassment at 
our magical — ^and inconvenient — appearance to be 
traced in his demeanor, sitting by the side of a plump 
and pleasing person, not quite my ideal of a feminine 
companion, but still attractive enough in a piquant, 
foreign way to stir feelings of envy in my manly 
•bosom at the scapegrace George’s situation. Haines 
evidently shared the same sentiments. 

‘‘ George,” he said, there’s a raging husband 
thirsting for your blood. Let him catch you with 
Madame, and you’ll be carried back to England on a 
stretcher.” 

“And look here,” I chimed in. “ Not content with 
throwing us over for the whole of this trip, you do 
your best to drag us into an unsavory scandal over 
which Archie and I get all the kicks, while you pocket 
the halfpence; and not only halfpence, by Jove!” — 
for a closer inspection showed me that the lady was 
a chemical blonde of considerable attractions — “ but 
gold into the bargain.” 

I shouldn’t have said myself that, after our mode of 
address, any introduction was necessary to complete 
the formalities of the occasion. But George thought 
otherwise. 

“ Messieurs mes amis — Madame Chablis.” 

The introduction including us both, Haines and 
myself bowed simultaneously, like Tweedledum and 
Tweedledee. Madame Chablis showed two rows of 
white teeth in a smile of welcome, which remained 
fixed as George proceeded to explain about “ le mari.” 

“Alphonse!” exclaimed that fiery person’s wife, 
■with a silvery laugh. “Ah, c’est ridicule!” 


S76 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


As her ignorance seemed bliss, Haines and I 
thought it would be folly to enlighten her as to her 
spouse's knowledge and estimate of the affair. Our 
duty was to George, not to a flighty Frenchwoman, 
and, in pursuance of that duty, we literally dragged 
George out of sight of Madame Chablis's waving 
handkerchief, and out of hearing of the cries of “ A 
bientot, mon cheri,” with which she pursued our 
struggling forms. 

The seriousness of the situation, enforced by every 
art of exaggeration, having been dinned into George's 
ears, he was immured in his bedroom until the even- 
ing, and then smuggled by a devious route to the 
night boat. Jealousy sharpens the wits, and, more- 
over, neither the constancy nor secrecy of Madame 
could be trusted, once she had rejoined her husband. 
Only when we were seated with our back to the cabin 
deck, and rugs across our knees, did we feel secure. 

‘^What really happened?" asked Haines, antici- 
pating me by the fifth of a second. 

George had the sense not to fence with the ques- 
tion. He started straightaway. 

“ I didn't give you fellows the go-by until I'd 
marked out my line of advance. I spotted Madame 
first with that husband of hers in the Casino, so I 
maneuvered myself to the next place at the ‘petits- 
chevaux,’ and when she had put down a stake I did 
likewise, and contrived to take her hand as we raised 
ours together. In case she wasn't one of the ‘ ready 
brigade,’ I repeated the trick, but it was all right, 
because, while Alphonse was talking to the croupier, 
she gave me ‘the glad eye' and glanced at the bal- 
cony, on which we both met a moment later." 

George paused, with the light of battle in his eye. 


SEPTEMBER 


m 

Chablis/’ he continued, looked as yellow as his 
name suggested when I was brought up to him five 
minutes later as an English ‘milor,’ an acquaintance 
of Madame’s in the days of TExposition, but I played 
my part to the life, talked about ‘ Madame la Com- 
tesse,’ and hinted at favors to come for the husband 
of the lady it had given me such pleasure to meet 
once more. As for the luncheon at Puys, which I 
arranged a deux, I never believed in the ‘ twin souls ’ 
theory till that hour when I found that Madame and I 
shared the same tastes in hors d'oeuvres and savories, 
and liked them long and lingering. After that there 
was no question of ‘ Parting is such sweet sorrow.’ 
We had the sweets without the sorrow, the only fly 
in the blanc mange — if I may say so — ^being the ne- 
cessity for avoiding Chablis.” 

‘"He evidently caught you out once,” interposed 
Haines, “ for he murmured something to us about 
your having ‘Keesed ’ees vife.’ For the honor of 
your country, I trust you did nothing of the sort.” 

“True, O King,” retorted George, with a levity 
that mocked the gravity of the occasion. “I did 
overstay my welcome yesterday, for Alphonse found 
me saying good-night on the doorstep. I had to take 
a flight of steps at a bound, and do the quarter-mile 
inside fifty seconds to save the Frenchy from com- 
mitting a breach of the peace. Still, it was worth it.” 

George closed his eyes in the ecstasy of recollec- 
tion, fit study for a picture entitled “Warrior, rest! 
Thy warfare o’er.” 

“You’ve behaved simply disgracefully,” I re- 
marked. 

“ Disgracefully,” echoed Haines, producing a pencil 
and pulling out his shirt-cuff. “ In case I’m in Dieppe 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


S78 

again, though, you might give me the lady's address. 
I believe I’ve held the ‘ twin souls ' theory all the time, 
without knowing it." 

But George had dropped off into a peaceful sleep. 
He was exhausted, and no wonder. 

‘‘ I’m very fond of George," I said to the disap- 
pointed Haines, ‘‘ but I’ll never go abroad with him 
again, unless he is padlocked to his lawful wife." 

And I won’t. 


OCTOBER 


“ Dans les premieres passions les femmes aiment I’amant, et dans 
les autres elles aiment I’amour ^’' — La Rochefoucauld. 


J 


OCTOBER 


The Progress of Mrs. Mallow — The Return of Major 
Griffiths — The Green-eyed Monster in Jermyn 
Street — A Crash in the Grecian Restaurant 

D O you know the Ponting-Mallows ? ” asked 
Lady Fullard of me, the other day, when I had 
called to inquire whether Homburg had had the de- 
sired effect on Sir John's health. 

“Fve met him/' I replied, with the discretion that 
is the better part of valor in Lady Fullard's drawing- 
room. 

“ Fm so sorry for the poor man," said her ladyship, 
clinging obstinately to her secret. 

‘‘ Now, my sympathies are entirely with her ! " 
Lady Fullard looked the astonishment she felt. 
“Then you have seen Mrs. Mallow?" she ex- 
claimed. 

“ Through an opera glass — at the theater,” I 
hastened to correct. “ But my opinion is based on an 
acquaintance with the husband. He's an impossible 
person." 

Lady Fullard bridled, — no other word would de- 
scribe the manner in which she drew herself up, as if 
to repel an insinuation shocking to decency and female 
self-respect. 

“If a woman is pretty, Mr. Hanbury," she said, 
“ there are always men who will condone any breach 
of the commandments she may commit." 

“ And members of her own sex who will convict 
281 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


282 

her upon merely hearsay evidence. ‘ Woman’s in- 
humanity to woman/ ” I went on, ‘‘ ‘ makes count- 
less husbands mourn.’ ” 

Lady Fullard stared at me. “The evidence against 
Mrs. Mallow is not hearsay — as you call it. Mrs. 
Bompas told me that that woman has run away with 
a soldier.” 

Had I been on the Bench, Lady Fullard’s idea of 
what constituted hearsay evidence would have given 
occasion for a judicial joke and “ laughter in court.” 
In the circumstances I said nothing, but took my 
leave as soon as I conveniently could. Lady Ful- 
lard’s drawing-room is like a lobster-pot — easy enough 
to enter, but jolly difficult to find a way out of. 

I happened to be dining with Steward that night, 
and, mentioning the matter in the course of idle con- 
versation, he proceeded to evince more interest than 
his ignorance of the parties, or their social insignifi- 
cance, warranted. 

“ The very thing,” he said, when I had done. “ You 
can earn a little honest money before anybody comes 
back to town.” 

“ What do you mean ? ” I asked, as well as a mouth- 
ful of salad permitted. “ I’m not going to ferret out 
the private life of a friend to gratify you and your 
public.” 

“ Never asked you to,” Steward retorted. “ I’m 
arranging a series of unconventional Society studies, 
dealing with the real thing, by folk who know what 
they are talking about. Wendover is describing how 
he shared his coronet with that kid from the ‘ Fire- 
fly,’ Lady Graeme is booked for ‘ Pin Money, and the 
way I make it,’ and now you come along with 
‘Delilah in Debrett,’ a subject that will write itself.” 


OCTOBER 


283 


‘‘ Delilah in Debrett ? ” I queried in wonder. 

“Rather!” and Steward's eye flashed journalistic 
fire. “ A cause celebre in the making, the stolen 
sweets of the Season, the shearing of a fashionable 
Samson. It's great ; we'll wind up with it, and boom 
ourselves sky-high.” 

“ It’s too great for me,” I retorted, “ so there ! ” 
And not another word would I say on the matter, al- 
though Steward pledged the Evening Star's credit up 
to the hilt. 

Steward’s suggestion, however, drove Lady Ful- 
lard's gossip still further into my thoughts, and I 
retired to bed with a growing inclination to satisfy 
myself as to its correctness. 

I haven't been a reporter for nothing. A man who 
can work up a column and a half a day, for the best 
part of a week, out of a hint dropped by an inebriated 
cabman, and a wrong address, isn't going to be 
balked by a maid who says “ Not at home,” and an 
Indian civilian who refuses to reply to letters. Find- 
ing my direct way blocked, I had recourse to chan- 
nels of information which are open to members of the 
Fourth Estate, and pieced together the following facts 
as being a strictly reliable sequence to the scene 
enacted on the lawn of the Welcome Club last 
August. 

It had been perfectly obvious on that occasion that 
the scales of affection between the lady and her 
cavalier did not hang evenly. Mrs. Mallow, having 
fallen from her trivial round of tepid flirtation, and 
insincere acquaintanceship with people whom in her 
snobbish soul she despised, into a state of genuine 
feeling, thought the world well lost in the Captain’s • 
company, Rowan, on the other hand, was inspired 


284 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


by no loftier an emotion than a desire for amusement, 
and his amatory plan of campaign included, at a very 
definite point on the map, a retreat for them both, 
Mrs. Mallow to her husband’s arms, he to India and 
his regiment. But, in defiance both of convention and 
strategy, the lady persisted in lingering on in the 
south to the despair of the Captain, whose leave did 
not expire until November. In her ordinary mood 
of arch coquetry Mrs. Mallow was trying enough. 
Under the influence of a strong attachment from 
which legal — or indeed social — sanction was withheld 
she became a woman whom a St. Anthony alone could 
have managed successfully. There was no character 
in the whole range of history or mythology whom 
the Captain less resembled than that particular saint. 
And whatever tolerance he may have had for the 
feminine weaknesses of Mrs. Mallow he lost during a 
period in which he employed every argument of per- 
suasion and threat to induce compliance with his view 
that the sooner ‘‘Julia” went to Harrogate and 
“ hubby ” the better for all parties concerned. Rowan 
uttered his words of wisdom with the voice of a bully. 
Matters came to a head with a stormy scene in the 
dining-room at Porchester Terrace, the man shouting 
out that he hated the very sight of her baby face, and 
then decamping to an unknown destination. After 
weeping her eyes out, the deserted lady ricochetted 
into a fit of connubial remorse, and out of it to Harro- 
gate. 

But Mrs. Mallow had fallen out of the frying-pan 
of brutality into the fire of selfishness and hypochon- 
dria. She found the husband she had married 
propped up in a bath chair, with lackluster eyes, a 
shaking hand, and a mind concentrated on his dietary. 


OCTOBER 


285 


The waters of Harrogate acting on a constitution cor- 
roded by Eastern suns had turned Ponting-Mallow’s 
thoughts inward. What to eat and what not to eat 
were now the supreme facts of his existence. His 
wife he expected to take the place of nurse, a position 
for which, had she known it, she had always been 
designated, even on her wedding day. A potential 
nurse, to be fed and clothed till the day came for her 
to sit by his bedside, measure out his doses, stir the 
fire, and read aloud — due reward and provision be- 
ing made for her by will — that was what Ponting- 
Mallow had seen in the white-robed figure, crowned 
with orange blossoms, meekly awaiting by the altar- 
steps the service that was to turn her from a free 
woman into an old man’s perquisite. Then London, 
with its promiscuous hospitality, its endless functions, 
its willingness to ask no questions so long as it was 
amused, had kept the young wife in cheerful igno- 
rance. There are plenty of doors in town that will 
open to a nes retroussce and a twenty-one-inch waist, 
and any number of tables at which a permanent place 
is kept for such qualifications. In the husband Mrs. 
Mallow met at the Yorkshire health resort she, for the 
first time, realized her fate. 

Try as she would, Mrs. Mallow could not inure her- 
self to the penance which was inflicted on her. For 
all his roughness, the Captain was virile, he mingled 
his insults with caresses, and he went some way to- 
ward satisfying the longings of Mrs. Mallow’s empty 
heart. The contrast was too much for the lady. She 
stayed a fortnight in an atmosphere of bath chairs 
and dressing gowns, and plunged in a soul-destroying 
routine of dietetic observance, for an invalid with the 
soul of a mummy, before dispatching a telegram to 


286 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Rowan’s club and flying from the intolerable ennui of 
Pouting and the Spa. 

It takes two to make a meeting, however, and the 
wily soldier was not to be drawn from his retreat by 
appealing notes or prepaid wires. September waxed 
and waned, the crops were cut, blinds were drawn up, 
and still Mrs. Mallow scoured the West End of Lon- 
don by day, and at night sat disconsolate amidst the 
sheeted furniture of her ill-starred home. But the 
reliance of the lady on the homing instinct drawing 
the leisured bachelor back to the metropolis from moor 
and mountain to replenish his wardrobe, and refill 
his cartridge-magazine, had its just reward. The Cap- 
tain was run to earth one morning in the Burlington 
Arcade, and what I suspect to have been a comedy of 
dissimulation took place on both sides. Rowan, caught 
unawares, unconditionally surrendered, apologized for 
the manner of his abrupt departure, and pleaded deep 
regrets for the inconvenient illness of an Irish uncle, 
which had kept him so long from the side of his 
“Julia.” Mrs. Mallow graciously accepted the la- 
bored excuses, concealing whatever feelings might have 
possessed her under a sweet smile. The old relations 
were resumed with new trappings, and the resorts of 
autumn fashion once more received the lady and the 
soldier. 

As to the permanence of the affair I can offer no 
opinion. All I know is that, wherever the final scene 
is enacted, it will not be in the pages of Steward’s 
journal. 

•' •' •’ '#• r*l 

Haines and I are both agreed that, in the interests 
of science, George Burn ought to bequeath his brain 
to the College of Surgeons for dissection and pres- 


OCTOBER 


287 


ervation, since nothing else but abnormal cerebral 
development can account for his vagaries. In July 
he -was convinced that only the instant adoption of 
Mormonism would save him from the consequences of 
his temperament. Now, in October, he is all for 
celibacy and death to Brigham Young. George at- 
tributes his changed ideas to “ years that bring the 
philosophic mind,'’ but, for the matter of that, he is 
only three months older than when he told me at 
Lord's about Lady Lucy Goring and Kitty Denver, 
and I notice nothing philosophical about him, save a 
tendency to moralize, which the sooner he drops the 
better. No, the reason for George's sudden conver- 
sion is the same as that of the couplet : 

When the devil was sick, the devil a monk would be, 

When the devil was well, the devil a monk was he. 

And a week at Henley Hall with Lady Lucy’s peo- 
ple, and Kitty Denver also staying there, was enough 
to cure George forever of so carrying on with two 
young women that they both fancied him in love with 
them. 

George himself was not inclined to be communica- 
tive on the events of that week. 

“I was off color in the match," he told us at the 
club, and no wonder, with the uncertainty as to what 
every hour might bring forth in the shape of re- 
proaches, recriminations, and even sterner rebukes 
from the outraged pride of the daughter of a hundred 
earls on the one hand, and a Transatlantic heiress on 
the other. With forethought, tact, and good luck, 
one might manage in town to prevent the rival forces 
meeting, and save oneself from the fate of a “wish- 
bone" at their hands, but within the circumference of 


288 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


a country house it would be impossible for any man 
so to control fate as to let each lady still continue to 
think that she was ‘‘the one and only’’ without her 
suspecting the presence of another. George hadn’t 
managed it, anyhow. When I inquired after Lady 
Lucy he turned a heavy eye on me, and said “ she 
was fairly fit ” in a tone that implied she hadn’t fitted 
in at all. 

“Wasn’t Miss Denver staying down there too?” 
asked Archie Haines, willfully ignoring the fact that 
George had himself informed us of her presence not 
a quarter of an hour previously. 

“ I believe she was,” replied George, with a singular 
absence of interest. 

“ Believe ! ” chuckled Haines. “ I thought she was 
a particular pal of yours.” 

“ I didn’t see much of her,” George answered 
wearily. 

“You were with Lady Lucy most of the time, I 
suppose ? ” Haines put his finishing question with a 
fair assumption of indifference. 

“ I didn’t see much of her either,” George made 
reply. “ Shut up asking me questions. I’m going to 
take forty winks,” and he composed himself accord- 
ingly. 

At the tfiirty-ninth wink, by my watch, George stole 
a peep and found us still staring at him. Haines 
shook his head. George sat up wide-awake in an in- 
stant. 

“You haven’t had much' of a nap,” I said, “and 
you want all the rest you can get after the sleepless 
nights you’ve had lately.” 

George showed no signs of comprehension, so I was 
forced to elaborate. “ Henley Hall — remorse at hav- 


OCTOBER 289 

ing treated two nice girls so badly — the smart of re- 
cent wounds — you know ! ’’ 

“Bilge ! ” George reserves this expressive term for 
emergencies. 

“You’d better give us the true version,” I went on; 
“otherwise the story will be getting about that you 
were tarred and feathered for constructive bigamy, or 
for being an accessory before the act.” 

“The truth is,” said George, “that girls read a 
great deal too much into a man’s unstudied actions.” 

“ When they ought to know,” added Haines, “ that 
he is only passing the time with them, and doesn’t 
mean half he says and does.” 

I was beginning to be interested. “ What does he 
say and do ? ” I inquired. 

George shuffled his feet and pretended not to hear. 
Haines answered my question. 

“ Tells her how sweet she looks, and that he must 
have supper and all the extras, and that he’s never 
seen such small hands, and he’s so sorry she’s angry, 
but if he hadn’t liked her very much he would never 
have done it, and isn’t that the music, and will she be 
in the Park next morning?” 

“ Well, if he says all that,” I gasped, “ he deserves 
as many wives as Solomon.” 

Haines stared at George, who was smiling — at his 
own thoughts, presumably. 

“Philanderers, like our friend George” — Haines’ 
voice was very stern — “ deserve ‘ the Death of a Thou- 
sand Cuts’ inflicted by their friends and acquaint- 
ances — the cut direct, the cut by inference, the cut 
dance — social ostracism, in fact, for a heartless 
criminal.” 

“ I agree,” I chimed in, “ but as Society is at pres- 


290 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


ent constituted, George gets petted and pampered, and 
encouraged in his wild and willful ways, and supplied 
with fresh victims by eager mothers, while a poor 
fellow like Griffiths, with no spirit, gets ‘caught out’ 
the first time.” 

“ That’s strange,” said George, joining in of a sud- 
den. “What made you mention Griffiths? He’s in 
the club somewhere. He was creeping upstairs as I 
came in.” 

Haines summoned a servant. “Our compliments 
to Major Griffiths,” he dictated, “ and Mr. Hanbury 
and myself would be glad if he would join us here.” 

“ It’s no use,” said George, getting on his feet as 
the man disappeared. “ It will take more than that 
to get Griffiths to meet us all. I’ll go and see what 
I can do.” 

Haines and I “ looked at each other with a wild 
surmise.” 

“ It sounds sad,” he whispered to me. 

“ Excruciating,” I whispered back. “ The saddest 
thing since Henry VIII died. Hush, here he comes ! ” 

We could just tell that the figure entering the room 
at that moment was our old friend Griffiths, but how 
changed from the victor of many a hard-won fight 
over “snooker-pool”; the warrior whose complexion 
mocked the rising sun; the man behind “the man 
behind the gun,” and ready to stay there so long as 
the cherry brandy in the butt lasted ; the sportsman at 
ten stone four, “ready to meet any other sportsman 
for a purse of ten sovs. and half the gate” at biting 
an inch off the end of the poker; the Merry Andrew, 
experienced in giving supper to rising “ stars,” and 
seeing shooting ones afterward — ^how changed ! 
There was no difference that one could lay an im- 


OCTOBER 


S91 


mediate finger on, but the whole man had altered 
somehow, much as though he had shrunk, although 
that wasn’t the explanation, because Griffiths’ clothes 
fitted him far better than in the old days, were neater, 
more fashionable, and his trousers had a crease — ^but 
in some subtle way virtue had gone out of him. The 
man we had known was dead, and a changeling spirit 
in possession. This ghost of Griffiths stared at us as 
though we had been strangers, and Haines and I 
found no other words of welcome than the conven- 
tional “ Hope you’re well.” We could no more have 
slapped him on the back than we could have offered 
him a drink. 

Fortunately for our good name as bachelors, George 
had had no misgivings in that direction, for a waiter 
stepped forward with four whisky-and-sodas on a 
tray, mixed according to the Major’s famous recipe — 
two big whiskies and a small soda split, and not 
quite all the soda, please.” 

‘‘ Here’s luck ! ” said George, raising his glass. 
Haines and I followed suit. “ Here’s luck ! ” 

The look of despair on Griffiths’ face, as he paused 
before the tumbler that should have been his, checked 
our action in mid-air. 

“ Finish the toast without me, you fellows,” the 
Major said, with painful distinctness and hesitation. 
‘H’ll have a limejuice and ‘polly’ instead. My wife 
thinks I’m inclined to gout.” 

We all stared open-mouthed. Inclined to gout! 
Why, Griffiths had been a martyr to gout for years, 
but he’d never thought it necessary to take so drastic 
a step as knocking off his “pegs” for such a trifle. 
According to the same chain of reasoning, the lion in 
the Zoo ought to leave off meat and subsist on nuts. 


292 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


because it sometimes gets indigestion from swallowing 
a shin bone. The thing is simply not worth it. 

Haines left his glass untouched, I rubbed my eyes 
to make certain I wasn’t having a nightmare, and 
George’s whisky went down the wrong way, and he 
collapsed in a paroxysm of coughing. The Major 
felt that an apology was expected of him. 

‘‘ Faith says,” he began, “ that I’m putting on too 
much weight for my years, and that I shall enjoy life 
much more with two stone less to carry.” 

Here Griffiths puffed his chest out to prove the 
soundness of Mrs. Griffiths’ counsel. We three con- 
tinued to sit there like children at a conjuring enter- 
tainment, in eager anticipation of a rabbit and a bowl 
of goldfish being produced from beneath the perform- 
er’s waistcoat. To fill up an awkward pause — since 
no rabbit or goldfish appeared — the Major took a sip 
at his limejuice horror, and absent-mindedly made a 
very wry face — absent-mindedly, because it didn’t fit 
in with his role of the repentant sinner rejoicing in 
his salvation. 

‘‘ I shall hope occasionally to see something of you 
all now I am back in town,” he proceeded, with the 
aspect of reciting a lesson he had committed to 
memory. Faith says ” 

But here Haines’ patience gave way. 

‘‘Confound what your wife says, Griffiths! Judg- 
ing by the instances you’ve quoted, she talks utter 
piffle. The important point is, what do you say? 
Haven’t you any opinion of your own now you are 
married? ” 

“Temper the wind to the shorn lamb, Archie!” I 
said. “ Don’t lay down such a startling doctrine to 
a newly married man, all at once ! We must help him 


OCTOBER 


S93 


to stand alone gradually. When he has learned to 
fasten his boots up by himself, we can then teach him 
how to smoke a cigarette — only one at a time, though, 
lest the pretty drawing-room curtains smell ! ” 

The Major had sunk into a chair in amazement at 
the reception accorded to Mrs. Griffiths’ wisdom. But 
George had still to have his say. 

“If you come into the club. Major, you’ve got to 
behave like a Christian and a gentleman, not like a 
savage, babbling of lime juice, and banting!” 

The Major had not yet learned his salutary lesson. 
“ But Faith ” he began. 

“Man cannot live by Faith alone,” retorted the 
merciless George, “ and if you try to, you’ll be under- 
ground by next Christmas. What’s the good, my 
dear fellow, of going to all the expense and trouble of 
acquiring bad habits, if you’re going to ‘ chuck ’ them 
at the orders of a girl who wasn’t born when you 
smoked your first cigar, and who’ll wish she never had 
been by the time you’ve smoked your last ? ” 

To convince, a point of view has only to be stated 
emphatically enough. The gloom cleared from the 
Major’s brow, familiar wrinkles deepened around his 
mouth, the merry crow’s-feet reappeared, the un- 
natural repose vanished in a grin, and before any one 
realized what had happened a decanter stood by 
Griffiths’ elbow, and he had mixed a potion of which 
the rich hue gave the blush of Hebe’s cheek, five 
“ bisques ” and beat it three up and two to play. 

In less than no time the Major was confidential as 
of yore. 

“ My wife,” he informed us, “ is too full of theories 
— wants me to resign the club, because it will un- 
settle me for home life. Why, I’d resign her first! 


294 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Didn’t tell her that, though ” — and the Major winked 
— “ said I’d break it off by degrees. Faith’s a clever 
woman,” he went on, nearly at the end of the decanter, 
‘‘ but she doesn’t understand men ; very few of ’em do 
— think if they coddle us and stroke our hair, we’re 
going to sit at home every night, but we’re not, we’re 
not ! ” 

The Major set the refrain “ We’re not ! ” to a music- 
hall tune much in vogue and beat time with his 
fingers. 

I looked at my watch. “ Faith’s saying to herself 
all sorts of things about your being still out, Major. 
Oughtn’t you to be going to her?” 

“ Hi, there ! ” shouted the husband so addressed to 
the smoking-room attendant. “ Telephone for four 
stalls at Daly’s, and tell the steward I am dining at 
7.30 with three friends, and want oysters, a brace of 
nice partridges, a dish of Peches Melba, and a Jero- 
boam of the Pommery 1900!” 

Then the Major looked around for the admiration 
he sought, and found it. 

“The secret of a happy marriage,” said Haines to 
me sotto vocBj as we left the place to dress for the 
Major’s dinner, “is for the respective spheres of au- 
thority of husband and wife to be well defined. Each 
should know where to draw the line.” 

“Just so,” I replied. “But what a pity Griffiths 
has never learned to draw anything — except corks ! ” 

Can I overcome my objections to matrimony suffi- 
ciently to give up my flat, and the vices which make 
life worth living, and clipping the wings of my muse, 
put it in a nursery to croon nonsense to a fat podgy 
creature with no hair, and a crinkled mouth that blows 


OCTOBER 


295 


bubbles, and says ‘‘ Goo-goo ” ? I was beginning to 
think I could, till Audrey Maitland came to tea here 
this afternoon, under the chaperonage of Lady Susan 
Thurston, and had a desperate flirtation with Clive 
Massey, while I, the host, was neglected. Besides 
being a gross breach of the laws of hospitality, it was 
exceedingly thoughtless of Audrey, for although he 
apes the ways of a man, Massey is only a boy, and to 
play with a boy's feelings is shameful. Dolly Thurs- 
ton has certain rights in him which oughtn't to have 
been ignored as they were, and I blame her for watch- 
ing impassively while her friend — if Audrey is still 
her friend — ^made a barefaced assault on Massey's 
heart. Lady Susan, too, should have had more sense 
of what was due to her daughter than to have tolerated 
the proceedings. And as for Massey, letting himself 
be made a stalking-horse by an outrageous flirt, so that 
a fellow-man, who has befriended him like a father, 
might suffer cruelly by his folly — the less said about 
his ignoble part the better. 

No, I'm not jealous. I have many, many faults, 
but jealousy is not one of them. I am deeply pained 
and grieved, that is all, at my mis judgment of all 
their characters, and I’ll never speak to Miss Audrey 
Maitland again. Indiscriminate flirting is a social 
curse that must be stamped out at all costs, and I 
intend to show my whole-hearted disapproval of the 
practice by cutting one of the worst offenders — Miss 
Audrey Maitland — at the first opportunity. Mean- 
while, I sent the following letter after her, directly she 
had left: 

‘‘Dear Miss Maitland: 

“ I'm so glad you could come to tea, and that you 


^96 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


got on so well with Clive Massey. He’s a charming 
fellow, and with no fault save that he's unstable in his 
affections, and forgets all the old faces when he’s at- 
tracted by a new one, which is pretty often. Person- 
ally, I prefer old friends best. But after your conduct 
this afternoon, I can’t expect you to agree with me. 

“ In case you may wish to see more of Mr. Massey, 
he is up at Christ Church, Oxford. Telegraphic ad- 
dress : ‘ Blood. Peckwater.’ But ‘ Stage Door, Fire- 
fly Theater ’ will be more likely to find him. 

“I am just off around the world! 

“ Yours very truly, 

‘‘G. Hanbury.’^ 

... I had mapped the whole thing out so beauti- 
fully. Lady Susan was to sit in the big armchair 
by the table and preside, Dolly and Massey were to 
occupy the sofa near the fireplace, while my writing 
chair, reserved for Audrey, was so placed that it could 
be left without disturbing the rest of the party, and 
Audrey be shown my treasures till we had maneuvered 
around to the small settee behind the bookcase, where 
she and I were to remain ensconced until Lady Susan 
thought things had gone on long enough.” I had 
arranged volumes of prints and photographs handy 
so that the chaperon’s attention might be occupied if 
the conversation flagged. Dolly and her young man 
could be safely left to their own resources. 

It may have been a false step on my part to have 
gone into the passage to meet my guests, a step due 
to my anxiety to greet Audrey suitably, for when I 
ought to have been stage-managing the party within, 
I was hanging up coats outside. The first hitch 
occurred when Dolly Thurston plumped into the place 


OCTOBER 


297 


appointed for her mother — the minx looked ridiculous 
in the big- chair, with her feet not touching the floor. 
Then, if you please, Lady Susan must sit down on 
the sofa by the Are, asking, “ Who is coming to share 
this with me ?” I thought Ld never heard such a 
silly question from a grown-up woman — as though she 
couldn’t perfectly well have sat there by herself. 
Massey, however, showed no signs of doing the 
obvious gentlemanly thing, by saying, “ I shall be de- 
lighted to, Lady Susan.” Nothing of the sort; in- 
stead, he was hanging over Miss Maitland, — the only 
person to take the right chair,— chattering to her as 
though I didn’t exist. I had to sit by Lady Susan. 

When things begin wrong, they generally go on 
from bad to worse. Dolly poured out the tea dis- 
gracefully. One cup was full of tea leaves, the next 
was too strong to drink, and then, going to the other 
extreme, she flooded the pot and gave me hot water 
faintly flavored with Orange Pekoe. Audrey Mait- 
land was in a mischievous mood, laughing at Massey’s 
brainless remarks as though they contained the essence 
of wit, and then rallying me on my silence. As for 
Lady Susan, she was as ‘‘jumpy” as the Chicago 
Wheat Pit in a crisis. The cushions didn’t suit, the 
footstool had to be placed at a different angle, she 
wanted milk instead of cream, and her tea cake had 
to be changed for a sweet biscuit. It would have 
given me the utmost pleasure to have smothered her 
in her own veil, and hid her body in the wainscoting. 
Her one redeeming feature was that she liked my 
rooms, and said so. 

“ This is a charming place of yours, Mr. Hanbury. 
Do you get through much work here?” 

“ Mr. Hanbury doesn’t do any work,” put in Miss 


S98 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Maitland, before I could reply. “ His theatrical cor- 
respondence takes up all his time.’' 

An uneasy thought crept into my mind that the girl 
might know about the letter I had in my pocket from 
Cynthia, asking me to go to the next Covent Garden 
ball and save her from an all-night dose of Jimmy 
Berners. As Audrey was neither Miss Maskelyne, 
nor Miss Cooke, I dismissed the suspicion, for a feel- 
ing of annoyance at the cool aspersion on my char- 
acter. 

“ Lady Susan,” I replied, I do all my work here. 
Knowing nothing of my habits, Miss Maitland thinks 
it amusing to invent.” 

“ Manners have changed very much since I was a 
girl,” Lady Susan remarked. ‘‘ We were taught in 
those days to take men seriously, and we married very 
much earlier, in consequence.” 

Was Lady Susan becoming a humorist? Audrey 
Maitland and Dolly broke into shrieks of laughter, 
the latter saying, ‘‘ Mother, you are funny ! ” I con- 
fess I saw nothing funny in Lady Susan’s statement, 
which struck me as extremely sensible. 

‘‘ That’s why American women have to come over 
to Europe to find husbands,” explained Massey, tak- 
ing part in the general conversation for the first time. 
‘‘They never ‘go off’ in New York, because they 
‘ pull fellows’ legs so.’ ” 

“ ‘ Pull fellows’ legs ’ ? ” asked Lady Susan. 
“ What dreadful slang is that, Gerald ? ” 

Massey looked abashed — for him. 

“ Make fun of them, tease them — what Miss Mait- 
land was doing to Hanbury,” he explained. 

“ My dear,” said Lady Susan, looking across at 
the girl, “ I hope you were doing nothing of the sort. 


OCTOBER 


S99 


As I am always tellingf Dolly, ‘If you want men to 
like you, you must humor them!'” 

Miss Maitland gave a becoming toss of her head. 

“ I don’t believe any man would respect a woman 
who showed she had so little self-respect as to descend 
to flattery to make him like her.” 

I liked the spirit with which that was said, and the 
blush accompanying it, but then the girl spoiled the 
whole effect by withdrawing with Massey to the alcove 
behind the bookshelf which I had mentally reserved 
for our two selves, and there carrying on a whispered 
duologue which entirely destroyed my peace of mind, 
and led me into inattention toward the remarks of 
Lady Susan and her daughter. Dolly’s equanimity 
in the situation created by her friend’s coquetry, and 
Massey’s neglect, filled me with astonishment. Surely 
there couldn’t be connivance on her part, and myself 
the victim of a carefully laid plot? I was still oc- 
cupied in sounding the appalling depths of treachery 
and ingratitude this idea revealed when Lady Susan 
prepared to depart. I made no attempt to stop her. 
Tea -parties of more than two are a mistake, and with 
that number tea is merely a superfluity. My expres- 
sions of regret were perfunctory and hypocritical, and 
I avoided shaking hands with Miss Maitland. I don’t 
like nourishing vipers in my bosom. 

The only satisfaction I got over the whole affair was 
in writing the letter to Miss Maitland, although I 
don’t quite know what to make of the reply I received 
half an hour ago. 

“ Dear Mr. Hanbury : 

“ Your letter was unnecessary, for Mr. Massey had 
already given me his address. I think you have 


300 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


formed quite a wrong impression of his character, 
and he will, I am sure, prove as stable a friend as most 
people. I don’t know what you mean by ‘ my conduct 
this afternoon.’ The reference seems to me to be 
rather impertinent! 

‘'If you are back from' your voyage round the 
world by then, will you come to tea with me next 
Tuesday? 

“Yours sincerely, 

“A. Maitland.’^ 

Really George is right. The less one has to do with 
women the better! 

• • « • • 

I’m not superstitious, and I’ve never seen anything 
in the shape of a ghost, but I’m as certain as I’m 
sitting here at my desk that it was fate which made 
me suggest to Archie Haines on Saturday night that 
we should sup at the Grecian Restaurant instead of 
Oddi’s, as he wanted. I have hardly been to the 
Grecian since my ’Varsity days, and the last time I did 
go our party left without paying for the crockery and 
glass we had broken while pelting an objectionable 
individual at the far end of the supper-room with rolls. 
But we were unlikely to meet people we knew there, 
and I was afraid of Haines tacking us on to another 
table if we went to a resort which he and his friends 
patronized to the extent they did Oddi’s. 

The gallery of the Grecian, divided up into com- 
partments looking on to the restaurant, allows the 
occupants to see everything passing below without 
becoming themselves the subject of observation. For 
this reason the place is in great request among a 
certain section of the cosmopolitan London world, and 
accordingly Haines and I thought ourselves in luck’s 


OCTOBER 


301 


way to secure the last box that was vacant, and with 
it a chance to sup in peace before the unkind licensing- 
law of the land turned us adrift at midnight. Once 
engaged in the congenial task of sampling the oysters 
and deviled kidneys which Haines and the waiter in 
collaboration had set before us, there was plenty to 
draw our interest in the piquancy of the crowded 
supper tables, the glow of rose-colored lights, the 
soft caress of conversation, the undercurrent of pas- 
sion which throbbed in the air and sent the warm tide 
of youth flowing the more fiercely through our veins. 
The men, well groomed and opulent, the women, 
en grande toilette, their necks flashing diamonds, their 
fingers beringed, floated on a sea of pleasure, the 
waves of which beat upon us. 

Haines and I snapped our fingers at despair, steal- 
ing just one hour of careless merriment from the heri- 
tage of sorrow and regrets which Time holds in trust 
for all the sons of men. We surrendered ourselves 
to the spell that was being woven in smiles and 
laughter by our fellow-revelers. 

“You wouldn’t think there was much wrong with 
the world to look at this,” remarked Haines, voicing 
my own thoughts as he did so. The words had 
scarcely crossed his lips than, in dramatic contradic- 
tion, there came a crash out of the partition at his 
back. 

“ Come in,” said Haines pleasantly. 

A second, and a harder, blow followed. 

My companion laid down a spoon with which he 
had been demolishing a soufllee. 

“ Confound the fellow, whoever he is, making that 
shindy!” he said. “If he can’t carry his liquor like 
a gentleman he should stop at home.” 

And Haines proceeded to hammer back — to no ef- 


S02 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


feet, for to the tattoo of blows on the wall was now 
added a voluble clamor, rising to such a crescendo of 
sound that the restaurant paused in its several occupa- 
tions to locate the uproar. 

I went to the door, and, looking out, waylaid an 
agitated waiter. 

“What’s the matter?” I asked. 

“Ze gentleman say ’ees bill is wrong,” replied the 
fellow, all eagerness to explain and justify the contro- 
versy of our neighbors. “I nevair make out ze bills 
wrong, nevair! ’Ee ’as drunk too much. Pauvre 
madame ! ” and the gargon threw up his hands in a 
pantomimic gesture of sympathy. 

“ There’s a woman in it,” I explained to Haines as 
I resumed my seat. 

“ Can’t we do a little prospecting on our own ? ” he 
inquired, as he went to the balcony and looked over. 
Apparently he could, for, craning his head around the 
corner of the partition, my friend proceeded to give 
me details of the field of battle while maintaining a 
strategic position that passed unnoticed by the com- 
batants, so hotly were they engaged. 

“A case of Edwin and Angelina,” Haines tele- 
graphed back to where I stood, “ with all the makings 
of a rare old row. Edwin, full of wine, is swearing 
like a trooper that he never ordered ‘ Cordon Rouge,’ 
and that he’ll be hanged if he’ll pay for what has 
been drunk in mistake. Angelina, ‘ perfect little 
laidy ’ — ^but wishing she hadn’t taken a night out with 
a chap who looks like ending up in Vine Street. Stern 
manager, black as thunder, and wondering whether 
he shall call in the police, or chuck the Johnny out 
himself. Hello, there’s the first casualty ! ” 

The crash of breaking glass corroborated Haines. 


OCTOBER 


803 


He swiftly withdrew his head and reappeared at my 
side. 

‘‘ I’m going to get out of that,” he remarked, “ be- 
fore they start flinging the rest of the table decorations 
about. Take a look yourself, Hanbury,” Haines went 
on, as though my personal safety could be endangered 
with impunity, ‘‘ and see what you diagnose the thing 
at.” 

I did as Haines bade me, for with everybody else 
in the Grecian an interested spectator of the scene, I 
felt out of it. So, gripping the railing of the balcony, 
I stretched my head into full view of the affair. 

Gracious heavens, what did I see? — Mrs. Ponting- 
Mallow, with that blackguard captain by his disgrace- 
ful behavior turning the limelight on her and her 
folly! I scrambled back to Haines. 

‘‘Well?” he asked. 

“I know the woman,” I exclaimed, panting with 
excitement. “ She’ll go under for good if any scandal 
comes out.” 

“What can you do?” queried Haines. 

“ I don’t know,” I said, “ except tell a cad what I 
think of him. But I’m going next door all the 
same.” 

Haines’ only answer was to fit a cigarette into his 
holder and follow me outside. It would have been 
useless to stand upon ceremony for an entry into the 
next compartment, where the devil’s own row was 
proceeding, so we merely thrust our way through the 
knot of eavesdropping waiters clustered round the 
door, and marched straight in upon the stage set for 
the last act of “ Mrs. Mallow’s Adventure.” 

We were confronted with a situation that promised 
to lead up to a denouement of melodramatic intensity. 


304 ^ 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Captain Rowan was lolling back in his chair, before 
a table littered with the debris of an expensive meal, 
both hands thrust into his pockets, his face flushed 
the deep red of excess, the veins on his temples swollen 
with anger, his eyes bloodshot. He wore a look of 
sullen ferocity, and was obviously very drunk. Fac- 
ing him stood the manager of the Grecian, a massive 
foreigner in a frock coat, at the end of his endurance, 
for as we appeared he issued the ultimatum that if 
Monsieur wouldn’t pay his bill and leave quietly the 
police should be sent for and he would be given in 
charge. But it was Mrs. Mallow whom I regarded 
with most solicitude, where she sat crying into a lace 
handkerchief, her whole body quivering with sobs, a 
picture of woe and abandonment which would have 
stirred any chivalry in Rowan’s nature had he pos- 
sessed such a soldierly quality. From the agonized 
and terror-stricken look she gave as she raised her 
tearstained face on our entrance, I believe she ex- 
pected the police to arrive every moment. Then her 
expression wavered between relief at seeing me, and 
shame at my discovering her in such a mise-en-scene. 

Can I do anything, Mrs. Mallow ? ” I said. ‘‘ I 
heard the broken glass, and thought perhaps an acci- 
dent had occurred.” 

The excuse was very lame, but it served to justify 
my intervention. To such a pitch of excitement were 
we all wrought that no explanations as to the nature 
of the predicament in which Mrs. Mallow found her- 
self seemed required. We behaved as though it were 
the most ordinary thing in the world to meet the wife 
of a friend supping alone in the Grecian with a man 
other than her husband, and that man intoxicated into 


OCTOBER 


305 


the bargain, and threatened with Vine Street police 
station by an irate manager. 

‘‘ I am a friend of this lady,” I explained to the 
latter, who was inclined for a moment to resent an 
intrusion which might mean reinforcements for his 
refractory client. But this suspicion was instantly 
dispelled by the action of the Captain, who, mistaking 
us for members of the restaurant staff come to assist 
in his expulsion, rose to his feet, and maintaining an 
unsteady position by leaning on the table for support, 
glared at us in tipsy menace. 

I re-refush pay a farthing more,” he said in a 
thick utterance, “ if I shay here all nigh’. Wha’ you 
think of thish for a bill ? ” and he flung the document 
at my head. 

“ If it’s a question of the bill I’ll settle the item in 
dispute if it will only make you go home,” I replied. 
“ There’s the lady to think about ! ” 

Wha’ lady ? ” spluttered Rowan, resuming his seat 
heavily as his legs suddenly gave way under him. 
“Wha’ lady?” 

“ The lady you’ve been dining with, of course. Pull 
yourself together, man!” And I shook him by the 
sleeve. 

“ Lemme go,” the Captain exploded. “ I don’t 
know wha’ you mean.” 

The shock of this denial dried Mrs. Mallow’s tears, 
and her sobs ceased. 

“Are you mad, Stuart?” she asked^ in astonish- 
ment. 

The Captain’s expression became more savage, were 
that possible. 

“ Hoi’ your tongue 1 ” he growled. “ I’ve finish- 


306 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


•shed with you; never inten’ shee you again, whining 
all sh-time at me. Finish-shed ! ” 

To give dramatic point to his words, Rowan swept 
his arm along the line of glasses and decanters before 
him and hurled them to the ground. 

The sight of this destruction was too much for the 
manager, and he advanced furiously on the offender. 
The storm that all the restaurant was waiting open- 
mouthed for, men and women clustering at every 
point of vantage below, seemed about to burst, 
when Mrs. Ponting-Mallow took command of the 
stage. 

‘‘Leave him to me,” she cried, brushing aside the 
manager, her voice thrilling with anger at the Cap- 
tain’s insult to herself. Then she leaned across the 
table, her handkerchief clenched in her fist. “ How 
dare you. Captain Rowan? Apologize this very 
minute ! ” 

At this uprising of the victim the other three of us 
stood spellbound. Mrs. Mallow was in no mood to 
be interfered with. 

“Will you apologize?” she asked again, standing 
over the Captain like an avenging fury. 

Rowan sat stolidly in his chair, looking at the 
broken glass, but said never a word. 

“ Stuart, you’re a cur ! ” hissed the lady. “ You’ve 
killed every atom of feeling I ever had for you. My 
deepest shame is that I have ever known you. If I 
were a man I’d horsewhip you. But you shall re- 
member the rest of your miserable life what my scorn 
is like,” and raising her fist, she leaned across the table 
and struck Rowan with all her strength, first on one 
cheek and then on the other. The Captain’s head 
rattled with the blows, as though it had been a drum. 


OCTOBER 


S07 


and a trickle of blood commenced to flow from a gash 
made by one of Mrs. Mallow’s rings. 

With the exception of the livid marks left by the 
blows, the Captain’s face became deathly pale. 

‘‘Julia ” he began, sobered by the shock, but 

Mrs. Mallow checked him. 

“ Don’t dare to utter my name ! ” she flung at the 
cowering and degraded man. “ Never speak to me 
again. I’ve done with you — you are a coward and a 
brute, who would bully a woman till she turns to bay, 
and then crawl to her. You’ve never cared a scrap 
about my reputation, or my happiness. All you have 
thought of has been yourself. My being with you 
here to-night hasn’t prevented your making a 
thorough beast of yourself, although by creating a 
disgraceful scene you risked exposing me to insult 
and publicity. You have been anxious to get rid of 
me ever since you had got everything out of me you 
wanted. But now you shan’t have the chance of 
throwing me over. I discard you myself forever. I 
think you’re the most contemptible creature I have 
ever known.” 

Under the force of this indictment, the Captain 
literally crumpled up. If he had been an unpleasant 
sight when we first entered the box, he was worse now 
with his manhood oozed out of him, his clothes in 
disarray, his hair tangled and matted, the perspiration 
streaming from his forehead, his face discolored and 
bleeding, debauchery and stricken pride combining 
to produce a spectacle for gods and men to stand 
aghast at. 

The manager’s knowledge of human nature told him 
that he would have no more trouble over the unsettled 
account, and he withdrew. We were proceeding to 


308 


TOO ]\IANY WOMEN 


do likewise, when a word from Mrs. Ponting-Mallow 
stayed me. 

‘‘ I am deeply pained,’’ she said, as soon as we were 
alone, in exhausted tones that showed the crisis 
through which she had passed, “that you and your 
friend should have witnessed such a scene, but I know 
I can rely absolutely on your discretion.” 

“ Of course,” I replied, taking the lady’s opera cloak 
from its peg, as a hint of what o’clock it was. “ I 
shall equally contradict any rumors I may hear.” 

“ Rumors ? ” and Mrs. Mallow paused in the act of 
drawing on her cloak. 

“Well, people have been talking — ^perhaps natu- 
rally!” 

Mrs. Mallow came close to me. It was strange how 
we both ignored the man in the corner. 

“ Mr. Hanbury,” she asked, “ what sort of rumors 
were they ? ” 

“Well, unpleasant. Charity, you know, begins at 
home, and usually stays there.” 

Mrs. Mallow frowned. 

“ You saw me with that ” she failed to frame a 

phrase suitable to the object huddled up on the table — 
“ once before. I’ve been a silly little fool, if not 
worse. Oh yes, I have,” she went on, as I made a 
feeble gesture of protest. “ But I’ve learned my les- 
son to-night. I’ve got a comfortable home, and how 
many women can say that ? ” 

Mrs. Mallow shuddered — at the idea, possibly, of 
what she had so nearly lost. She recovered herself 
with an effort. “Will you take me to a cab, Mr. 
Hanbury ? ” she asked. 

So I led the lady through the dim restaurant, look- 
ing, with its lights extinguished and its laughter fled. 


OCTOBER 


509 


like the shameful specter of a once beautiful woman, 
and saw her into a hansom. What became of Captain 
Rowan we neither of us cared a rap ! 

“ Home ? ” I asked, as the cabman waited for direc- 
tions. 

In spite of the evening’s experiences Mrs. Mallow 
smiled. 

Yes, home ! ” she replied. 

After all, a humdrum ending to “ Romance ” is the 
best. 


NOVEMBER 


Whoso hndeth a wife, findeth a good thing !* — Book of Prov- 
erbs. 



NOVEMBER 


Steward tells an old Tale — Cynthia Cochrane says 
Good-by — Back to Fleet Street — Two in a Fog 

W HAT is love ? ” is a question I have been 
putting- to my friends of late, in a sincere de- 
sire for enlightenment, to be so inundated with con- 
flicting definitions as a result that I despair of ever 
getting at the truth. One would have thought that a 
complaint which is at least as common as the measles 
would have been diagnosed correctly by this time, but 
apparently that is not so, and I am still floundering 
in a quagmire of doubt. For instance, love according 
to George Burn is a sensation of hot water running 
down one’s back.” That sounds too much like a 
shower bath for my tastes. — To my sister Dulcie love 
is ‘‘ forgetfulness of self in another’s happiness,” a 
beautiful saying, though a hard one — too hard for a 
selfish man. To Sybil Bellew love means marriage, 
and marriage means — all that marriage means to 
‘‘ two-and-twenty.” — Lady Fullard, to whom I sub- 
mitted my question in fear and trembling, said that 
“ love is all stuff and nonsense ; mutual esteem is the 
only thing worth having.” Somehow that reassured 
me, because if Lady Fullard had believed in love, I 
should have preferred to remain a skeptic on the sub- 
ject. More helpful was Haines’ theory that the 
symptoms of being in love were a willingness to give 
up week-end shoots and cigars and aversion to musical 
comedies. But he wound up his lecture with the ab- 

313 


su 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


surd remark that “ the proof of the pudding is in the 
eating.” Of course it is, but, as I told the idiot, ‘‘ the 
rot is that if one takes a single spoonful one’s got to 
finish the dish, whether one likes it or not.” Some 
day, perhaps, the ten years’ trial trips may come into 
fashion, but at present the weight of public opinion 
is in favor of the retention of the old-fashioned matri- 
mony, with its no jack-pot ” and all in the ante.” 

I have come back from my Socratic pilgrimage little 
wiser than I set out. Still it has been worth while, if 
only as a revelation of my friends’ points of view, and 
for the eliciting from Steward of the following: 

“ Love was given to Adam to create a new Paradise 
for himself. Love is Faith, Hope and Charity — Faith 
in the present, Hope for the future, and Charity for 
all time.” 

I had been sitting in front of the fire in his Chancery 
Lane rooms, while the shadows gathered thickly 
around, when the journalist, fondly polishing a meer- 
schaum pipe, had delivered himself of that fine 
aphorism. 

“ Steward,” I said, “ you speak with the accent of a 
lover.” 

The journalist’s face, turned to the glowing hearth, 
was twisted by a sudden spasm. As I caught the 
change I marveled w;hy I had regarded my friend as 
a misogynist, who had never strayed out of Fleet 
Street, and whose years had been dedicated to “ copy ” 
and proof-sheets. More, I realized that I had been 
singularly incurious as to the details of his past career, 
apart from its newspaper side. Steward’s reticence 
about himself had not been encouraging to would-be 
Boswells. It had been only natural to accept the man 
at his own estimate, and he had been at pains to de- 


NOVEMBER 


315 


scribe his life as consecrated to literature. It would, 
indeed, be a bold act to penetrate into the secret places 
of his heart, and pry behind the veil hung before its 
Holy of Holies, since Steward, if he invited confi- 
dences, never reposed them. 

Such were my reflections when the silence enfolding 
us was of a sudden pierced by the still small voice 
with which soul speaks to soul, and I became aware 
that my chance remark had opened some floodgate of 
memory in the other, and that the roaring of deep 
waters filled his ears. The shadows which danced on 
walls and ceiling in a flickering fantasy, and threw 
even such familiar objects as the fighting cocks on the 
piano into strange relief, might have been ghosts 
returned to haunt the living, so plain was the look 
of anguish Steward wore, and the lines of pain drawn 
round his mouth. Of a truth I knew in that moment 
that the past can never die, that what has been will be 
again, and the things a man has once suffered he must 
still endure. 

As I watched Steward with the absorption one turns 
on a dying man, his expression softened, his forehead 
smoothed as under the pressure of a woman’s hand, 
and, still searching the mysterious depths of the coals, 
he began very softly to recite these poignant verses: 

** La vie est vaine; 

Un peu d’ amour, 

Un peu de haine — 

Et puis, bonjourl .... 

La vie est breve; 

Un peu d’espoir, 

Un peu de reve, 

Et puis, bonsoir!** 


Steward broke the fixity of his gaze, and commenced 


316 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


filling his pipe, which, during his reverie, had fallen 
neglected to the floor. 

“ Shadows, shadows, that’s what we are ! ” he mur- 
mured, half to himself, half to me. “ Moths fluttering 
for a few brief moments round the lamp of life, our 
most lasting thoughts transitory, our deepest feelings 
shallow; the beauty of to-day but the skeleton of to- 
morrow; our separate existences of no more account 
than the paper boats launched by little boys on the 
river current, doomed to be overwhelmed in the first 
eddy they encounter. Why should a man tear out 
his heart over love, when, like any other mortal pas- 
sion, it is only a flower to be tended for a little while 
before it fades?” 

“ What has come over you?” I asked in astonish- 
ment. You spoke very differently a few moments 
ago. To love, then, was to create an earthly Para- 
dise.” 

‘‘Did I say that?” replied Steward in a far-away 
voice. “ I must have been thinking of Elise.” 

Elise? — The world was coming to an end if Steward 
could grow sentimental. 

A jet of smoke shot from the journalist’s mouth as 
his pipe sprang alight. 

“Hanbury!” he said. “ Forgive the indiscretion 
I am about to commit, of talking about myself. But 
my intuition tells me you have reached the parting of 
the ways, and that your future depends on the choice 
you are about to make. Before you finally decide, 
listen to the words of a man who, to his everlasting 
sorrow, took the wrong turning.” 

I felt myself incapable of making any coherent 
reply. Steward proceeded with his strange candor. 

“ Everybody is given one chance in this world of 


NOVEMBER 


317 


obtaining their heart’s desire. I threw away my 
chance when I lost Elise. No triumphs I may achieve 
in my profession, no heights of society or fame I can 
scale, will ever atone for HI gran rifuto/ as Dante 
called it. If the Florentine be right, and there exists 
a frozen hell for such sinners as have offended against 
themselves, I shall surely go there. For when I was 
offered love — so strong that the grave itself could have 
had no power over it, I spurned it. I only realized 
what I had lost when She had passed out of my reach 
forever.” 

‘‘Did death take her from you?” I asked, with a 
reverence that befitted the other’s tragedy. 

“ If it had, I should have been spared the remorse 
that torments me,” replied Steward, his face contract- 
ing with an agony of recollection. “No, I blame 
nobody but myself — and Paris,” he added, apportion- 
ing the guilt with a judicial accuracy. 

“ Love is the raison d’etre of Paris,” Steward went 
on, at an apparent tangent of ideas. “ The life of a 
Parisian is a prolonged intrigue, one long affair of 
gallantry. He thinks of nothing else. Yet a born 
critic, he is compelled to analyze even a woman’s 
heart; a profound skeptic, he doubts the permanence, 
or indeed the reality, of love. Having no illusions, 
he can have no faith. It was my curse that I met 
Elise in this atmosphere, when I was a special corre- 
spondent to the Exhibition.” 

“ But you weren’t a Parisian,” I interrupted. “ So 
it didn’t matter what Parisians thought, or how they 
behaved.” 

Steward smiled grimly. 

“ Paris doesn’t let the artistic temperament off as 
easily as that. By her appeal to one’s sense of all 


318 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


that is beautiful in literature and art, by her rapture 
in living for living’s sake, by the whispered entice- 
ments to Youth that stir in the plane-trees of her 
boulevards, and the fountains of her parks and gar- 
dens, by her gray stones and hoary traditions, by her 
joys and sorrows, Paris speaks to the artist as no other 
city. Mother and mistress, she demands the afYection 
meet for both. I showed my gratitude to her in the 
only way I could. I became more Parisian than the 
Parisians, discarding my English modes of thought 
as completely as though they had never existed. My 
mind had always been keen to see through folly 
and vice; it now saw through virtue. It was when 
thus transformed that one morning in the Bois I 
rested on the same seat as Elise, and our delight in 
the glorious July weather was so mutual and spon- 
taneous that we walked together, the girl becoming 
my guest for dejeuner at the Cascades.” 

‘‘ What was she ? ” I asked. A grisette ? ” 

“ She had been a governess in Touraine, and had 
returned to Paris to secure another situation. As far 
as I could discover she had no parentage worth speak- 
ing of. A Captain of Chasseurs had some claim to 
be her father, but Elise never could tell me the rights 
of the matter. My private belief is that she had 
dropped from a nest, and assumed human shape the 
moment before I came up, for she had the bright 
black eyes of a bird, the same quick movement of the 
head, and was vivacity itself. But I never bothered 
much about the question. Elise was created to make 
others happy, and herself miserable. She had the 
amazing intuition of the Parisian for every mood of 
her companion, and as she was a dozen women rolled 
into one, she could assume a fresh personality to suit 


NOVEMBER 


319 


the occasion. She could be obdurate, melting, unap- 
proachable, intimate, witty, provoking, and all in the 
hour. Her society was stimulating for the reason that 
one never knew whether her greeting would be an 
embrace or a repulse, sunny smiles or floods of tears. 
^Take her in one’s arms, and she might prove to be a 
shy wood nymph, or a Bacchanal.” 

.‘^You loved her, of course!” I interrupted, rather 
fatuously. 

“ I never had time to,” replied Steward, lighting a 
fresh pipe, ‘‘so occupied was I in studying Elise, in- 
voking the various spirits which possessed her. She 
was interested in everything, and I gave her the best 
that was in me to satisfy her craving for information 
and knowledge. She was a harp on the strings of 
which I played the most exquisite melodies that ever 
ravished the souls of a man and a woman. And how 
I wrote in those days! Heavens, how I wrote while 
Elise’s spell was over me! My articles on the Exhi- 
bition were a revelation to London, and the propri- 
etors of the paper doubled my salary. Two stories I 
found time to do went far to establishing my reputa- 
tion as a man of letters. My contemporaries were 
sinking into my train. In my pride I thought I could 
do without Elise, that it was myself, unaided, who had 
done these things. But the Artist, Hanbury, can 
never stand alone. He must receive inspiration from 
some source, and the higher and purer the source is 
the better it will be for him.” 

“But, surely,” I said in genuine surprise, “even 
from your own showing, Elise wasn’t conspicuous for 
virtue ? ” 

Steward’s look darkened. 

“ Don’t make the mistake of ignorant people, Han- 


320 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


bury, and apply terms like virtue and sin universally. 
In England, so long as one keeps the Seventh Com- 
mandment, and incidentally attends the Established 
Church, one may break all the others with impunity. 
Yet there are countries just as much deserving to be 
called virtuous as ours, where everybody goes about 
stark naked, and a woman thinks nothing of six hus- 
bands. Elise, like her countryfolk, was no hypocrite. 
She was a pagan, responsive to every natural instinct, 
and worshipping the beautiful. The pinnacles of 
Notre Dame, the curve of the Seine of Sevres, the 
Petit Trianon, the view over Paris from the Church of 
the Sacred Heart on Montmartre, the music of Tris- 
tan, the prose of Pierre Loti and Anatole France, the 
romances of Dumas and Balzac, the poetry of Hugo 
and De Musset, — Elise loved them all, with an ap- 
preciation that often wrung tears from her. I under- 
stood Elise. From me she drew silence, or conversa- 
tion, attention or indifference, as she had need of them. 
And because I understood her she loved me. Yet it 
was more than that. She felt that I required her, that 
to turn to her for sympathy, companionship, was a 
craving which took a firmer hold on my nature with 
each meeting. The divine motherhood flowing from 
a woman toward a man — precious ointment with 
which she would anoint his head — the comprehension 
of the strength and weakness of which he is com- 
pounded, impelled Elise to give me all that she had 
to give. I took it — to learn the greatness of the gift 
too late.’’ 

Steward’s masterly analysis of a woman’s soul, the 
subtle inflections of speech with which he etched in the 
lights and shades of his word-picture, the stress of 
mind which had led him to the confessional, had 


NOVEMBER 


321 


drawn me under the spell which Elise had woven — 
to his undoing and hers. My heart beat fast in an- 
ticipation of human blindness and error parting what 
God had joined; my temples throbbed with a pre- 
monition of woe. Steward was stretching me on the 
rack of his own agony, gagged by emotion and in- 
capable of uttering a word to break the narrative, 
which continued its course. 

“ Paris looks upon women as playthings, insepa- 
rable adjuncts of Man, who is the sun around which 
they must revolve — playthings to be discarded and 
adopted again at will, petted and deserted by turns. 
The menage a trois with which the theaters deal eter- 
nally mocks the fidelity of the sex, exalts feminine 
treachery into a cult. In this environment Elise's 
sacrifice, which should have convinced me of her de- 
votion to myself, merely confirmed my acceptance of 
the warped views I heard enunciated on all sides. I 
thought Elise without a soul. At the cost of the happi- 
ness of both of us she proved to me she possessed 
one.” 

The speaker’s voice died away for a moment, and 
his face was hidden in his hands. When Steward 
resumed it was with an obvious effort. 

‘^With a truly masculine confidence in my power 
to retain Elise’s affections, I grew casual in my treat- 
ment of her, prolonged my absences, frequented the 
society of other and less reputable women, proved by 
my conduct that I accepted the code of Parisian gal- 
lantry without reserve. Success had gone to my head. 
Had misfortunes come to me I should have flown, 
like a homing pigeon, to Elise’s arms, but destiny, to 
teach me a lesson, refused to allow a single failure to 
cloud my horizon. Then it was that one night return- 


S22 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


ing late to my apartment, I found a letter pinned on to 
the mantel to catch my eye. It was Elise’s farewell. 
I still keep it!” 

Steward broke the thread of his narrative to go to 
an inlaid cabinet that stood by the window, open a 
drawer and extract with much fumbling an envelope, 
with which he returned to his place. Drawing the 
contents forth, the journalist read the following, 
screening his eyes the while : 

'' My dearest Friend: 

‘‘ I say good-by to you with tears that will never 
cease to flow for the sorrow of our separation. But 
it is far better that you should weep for Elise departed, 
caring for her, perhaps a little, and pitying her much, 
than that, having her by your side, you should think 
lightly of her. 

“From the happiness that living with you has 
brought me, I know the sadness which life without you 
holds, but if, by renouncing you, I can prove to you 
the sincerity of my love, I renounce you gladly. For 
I do love you, with a passion that thinks nothing a 
sacrifice which can minister to your happiness. I am' 
leaving you, and with you my heart, so that you may 
keep the memory of our affection — for you do love 
me, little though you may suspect it — pure and un- 
stained, a memory unsullied by thoughts of Elise’s 
frailty and your own folly in wasting your talents on 
a light woman. 

“ We shall never meet again in this world. If God 
is good I may see you hereafter. My prayers shall 
win Paradise for us both. 

“Farewell, beloved, 

“ Elise.” 


NOVEMBER 


323 


The end was reached in faltering accents, but, be- 
yond a slight trembling of the hand which held the 
paper. Steward repressed all outward expression of 
grief. Forbearing to profane the moment with speech, 
I reached over and drew the sheet from my friend’s 
fingers. Written in French in small, precise char- 
acters, the letter conjured up a vision of that far-away 
night in Paris, when the man by my side was made 
conscious how he had flung away the pearl of great 
price. The thin sheets of violet-tinted paper, now 
faded almost white, still exhaled the perfume of the 
writer, recalling the gracious presence of a good 
woman. I cast a glance at the man whose life, ap- 
parently so full, was so empty, whose career, so envi- 
able, was robbed of the one prize which could make 
success worth acquiring. 

It was a full five minutes before the silence in the 
room was broken. 

“I believe Elise was right,” Steward said at last, 
once more in command of himself. “ Her instinct 
told her I should remain faithful to her forever, and 
that, while losing me in this world, she would possess 
me in the next. My heart is a shrine to her memory, 
wreathed with immortelles. No other woman will 
ever enter it. But Elise did a greater thing for me 
by giving me back my faith in her sex. And that is 
the moral of my long tale, Hanbury. Don’t try to 
analyze women ; love them for what they are ! Don’t 
pick them to pieces as you would a toy, for you can 
never put them together again! Destroy a woman’s 
faith in you, and her soul shall cry out against you 
at the Judgment Seat, and condemn you! If you are 
a cynic, never let your cynicism extend to Woman. 
For as it was a woman who brought you into the 


S24i 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


world, so pray that a woman’s consolation may lead 
you gently out of it ! ” 

I left Steward with Elise’s letter clenched in his 
hand. 

Vanity of vanities — all is vanity save the love of a 
man for a maid, and the love of a maid for a man ! 

Nothing less than the strictest sense of obligation 
to Cynthia Cochrane would have taken me, after 
Steward’s solemn warning, to Covent Garden Ball on 
the following Friday. Only the compulsion of strong 
friendship could have induced so reticent a man as 
the journalist to impart the secret of his lost Elise with 
the object of hastening my plunge into matrimony. 
But by going to a Covent Garden Ball at Cynthia’s 
invitation I was entrusting myself to influences de- 
cidedly anti-matrimonial, Cynthia because she was 
Cynthia, and the Ball because it stood at the opposite 
end of the scale to marriage. 

Covent Garden Ball is the one public function 
throughout the length and breadth of the United 
Kingdom to which Mrs. Grundy is refused admit- 
tance. If she so much as shows her nose under the 
fagade of the Royal Opera House on such an occa- 
sion, she is taken in charge by the constables on duty 
for causing a nuisance. Last time she appeared at 
Bow Street she was fined £5 by the presiding magis- 
trate. Therefore, once upon a time I used to be a 
regular attendant at the fortnightly fetes, but as cares 
have accumulated, and my habits grown more regular, 
I have been less and less, till now it is only imperative 
necessity which mulcts me of a guinea and half my 
night’s rest. 

On the particular evening when Cynthia had com- 


NOVEMBER 


325 


manded my presence in order to stave off the ardent 
attentions of James Berners, Esq., Solicitor, I had 
intended dining quietly at the club, finishing a long- 
overdue article on ‘‘Kings I have never met,” com- 
missioned by The Penguin, and looking in at the 
Ball about i a. m. But George Burn scented mischief 
from my mysterious demeanor, drew my destination 
from me, and enrolled himself in the expedition. One 
can’t say “No” to George with any effect, so I con- 
sented, and borrowed my entrance money off him as a 
forfeit. 

As we ascended the staircase from the underground 
buffet level to the polished floor laid over what, in the 
opera season, is the stalls, we were assailed by the 
blare of Dan Godfrey’s orchestra, and a rush of warm 
scented air from the house, crowded in every part — 
even the top gallery, reserved for spectators from the 
everyday world, being ringed round with a fringe of 
eager faces staring in amazement on the motley throng 
below. George and I thrust our way to a conspicuous 
position on the partition separating the promenade 
from the parquet, with no more mischance than the 
upsetting of a buxom lady whose partner was remedy- 
ing his ignorance of the waltz steps by a praiseworthy 
attempt at an Apache dance which involved seizing 
the fair one by the neck at intervals — none of them 
very lucid. Freed from this entanglement, we both 
surveyed the gay scene with interest 
' Most of the ladies present thought that if their 
skirts stopped short at the knees they had done enough 
in the way of disguise. Of the so-called fancy cos- 
tumes — a compromise between allegory and realism — I 
was inclined to award the palm to a svelte blonde 
whose petticoat of gauze net trimmed with bivalves. 


326 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


and headdress of kippers, represented Caller Her- 
rin’,” although George was strongly in favor of a 
charmer in heliotrope tights slashed with orange, 
green and scarlet, her bust draped in a tasseled cloak 
of gray panne. A great many men one knew seemed 
to be enjoying the ‘Might fantastic” after a debauch 
of covert shooting and domesticity, and George was 
kept busy returning the salutes of both sexes as they 
whirled past in revelry. 

It is an easier task to discover the proverbial needle 
in the haystack than to keep an assignation at Covent 
Garden, and I had given up all expectation of finding 
Cynthia when, happening to raise my eyes to the 
grand tier boxes, I suddenly saw a “ mask ” seated 
by the individual whose ancestors had obviously 
crossed the Red Sea with Moses. George had already 
gone buccaneering on his own account, so I made my 
way with all speed through the mass of spectators to 
the box and its occupants. 

Cynthia, disguised in a black satin loup and a 
domino, received me with an enthusiasm not shared 
by Jimmy Berners. He had taken the box for him- 
self and Cynthia, and he didn’t want to be disturbed. 
The disfavor with which he eyed me told me as much. 
But disturbed he had to be, and to a distance out of 
hearing. 

“Berners,” I said, ignoring his hostility, “there’s 
a pretty little woman in black and red by the buffet 
on the right of the band asking after you.” 

“ A little woman in black and red ? ” repeated Ber- 
ners, his anger forgotten at the pleasant fabrication. 
It was the ambition of his life to procure the reputation 
of a lady-killer, partly from the abstract delight he 
himself would derive from the title, and from the 


NOVEMBER 


327 


added worth he imagined it would invest him with in 
Cynthia Cochrane's eyes. 

‘‘Yes," I replied, “a little ripper. I had half a 
mind to forestall you, you dog! You sly dog! " and 
I poked Berners in the ribs. 

“ Quick's the word," I went on, so soon as he had 
recovered, “ before somebody else snaps her up. She 
was going to the supper-room.” 

“Did she mention her name?" asked the duped 
Berners, in a gallant pretense of knowing it all the 
time. 

“‘Tell Mr. Berners that Maudie wants him; he'll 
know.' That was all the message I got." 

“ Excuse me. Miss Cochrane," apologized Berners, 
fingering the door handle. “ I must just see the lady 
for a minute." 

“ If he sees the lady for a second," I said as the door 
closed on Berners, “ he's got better sight than I have.” 

“ Poor Jimmy,” said Cynthia Cochrane, who had 
sat an amused spectator of the comedy. “ It's a shame 
to tease him so. But he really must take lessons in 
conversation. He's already asked me twice to-night 
to marry him. I had to tell him I had come here to 
enjoy myself.” 

I thought of the duty that had brought me to Covent 
Garden Ball, and steeled myself for the deed. 

“Jimmy's not a bad sort,” I remarked, as uncon- 
cernedly as I could. “ One could do much worse than 
marry him.” 

“ Do you mean that advice for me, Gerald ? ” 

A frill of lace hid the expression of Cynthia’s 
mouth from me, but I caught a flash of indignant eyes 
through her mask. 

I evaded a direct answer. 


TOO MANY WO]\iEN 


If I were a woman, and thought a man cared for 
me, Fd let the knowledge weigh down a good many 
of his disadvantages.” 

Cynthia turned her head away. 

What nonsense you talk, Gerald ! You don^t 
even know the simplest facts about a woman. Why, 
if we could only control our affections like that, we 
should certainly be spared all the things that break our 
hearts.” 

‘‘ I seem to be having as depressing an effect on you 
as Jimmy,” I said, with an effort to be gay, despite 
the sadness stealing over me at the prospect, very 
close now, of parting from Cynthia. “ Cheer up, 
there’s the March Past beginning ! ” 

A crowd of dancers had congregated on the stage 
by the band*stand, ready to pass in single file before 
the judge’s box, while the rest of the company, in 
fancy dress and out, were being marshaled by stew- 
ards along a length of rope stretched down the ball- 
room, to keep a wide passage open, order being 
further guaranteed by the presence of an inspector 
of police and two constables. The band struck up a 
ragtime, and the competitors for the various prizes 
offered by the management started to display them- 
selves and their costumes by sidling and pirouetting 
down the line of spectators, to the accompaniment of 
cries of encouragement or derision, according as the 
popular verdict wavered. Ever and again a storm of 
cheering greeted a stage favorite, or a dress of un- 
usual originality of design, studded with electric 
lights, while the crowd behind kept up a succession 
of antics, varying from a display of high-kicking to 
a ring a ring o’ roses ” which ended in the partic- 
ipants collapsing in a struggling heap. I felt as 


NOVEMBER 


329 


though I should like to join the fun, instead of 
moping in a box over what had been, and could be no 
longer. 

All of a sudden I became aware that Cynthia had 
removed her mask, and, instead of watching the mad 
scene, was intent on studying my face. 

‘‘ Do you care for her very much ? ” she said at last. 

‘‘ Indeed I do,” I replied, surprised out of the secret 
I had planned to reveal in quite a different way. 

“ I guessed as much, Gerald,” Cynthia said, in a low 
voice. “ I haven’t had a line from you for a month, 
so I asked you here to-night to find out what was the 
matter. Your manner gave you away straight off. 
Well, it’s good-by this time! ” 

‘‘ I suppose it is,” I muttered. My idea had been 
to bring our friendship to an end on the ground of her 
future, but this seemed to be reversing the process. I 
felt remarkably uncomfortable. But if I expected any 
reproaches I was spared them. 

‘‘ The very best luck to you,” said Cynthia. You’ll 
ask me to the wedding, won’t you? You needn’t be 
frightened ; I shan’t come.” 

You’re going ahead too fast,” I replied, with a 
deep relief. “I haven’t got to the engagement yet. 
But, of course, if there’s a wedding, I shall want you 
to come, and feel deeply hurt at your absence.” 

Cynthia shook her head sadly. 

Of course, if I came to the wedding you’d be 
charming to me, and the more so because I shouldn’t 
be ‘ in the picture.’ But you’d wonder to yourself, 
‘ Why has she come ? ’ and your fashionable friends 
would stare and say, ‘ An actress ; what shocking bad 
taste of her to turn up,’ and the fat would be in the 
fire about your bachelor days before the honeymoon 


330 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


had properly begun. I don’t want to come to the 
wedding.” 

And drawing out her handkerchief, Cynthia dabbed 
her eyes with it. I felt uncommonly like following 
suit. It would never do if Jimmy Berners came back 
and found us both in tears. 

“Dear Cynthia,” I said, leaning forward to where 
the girl sat with her face hidden by her hands, “ don’t 
spoil it all by making me feel I’ve behaved like a 
brute. Things are much better as they have turned 
out, for I should only have destroyed your career. 
You’ve got a big one, you know you have!” 

“Yes, there’s always my career.” Cynthia’s voice 
shook with suppressed emotion. “But a career to a 
woman isn’t the same satisfying thing it is to a man. 
With her it is never independent of a home and a 
husband. She wants some one she loves to share it 
with.” 

Overcome by her emotion, Cynthia stopped. A 
knock came at the door of the box. I delayed a 
second in raising the latch, and put my face close to 
Cynthia’s. 

“ Cynthia,” I whispered. “ You’ve shown me what 
a good woman is. I’ll never, never forget you.” 

Then I gave her the last embrace of our long friend- 
ship. 

When Jimmy Berners entered a moment later he 
found her departing. 

“Any luck with Maudie?” I asked, more to turn 
attention from Cynthia than anything else. 

“You got that all wrong,” said Berners. “Her 
name was Grace,” and he sat down with a proprietary 
air. 

For his own sake I hope that Jimmy Berners didn’t 


NOVEMBER 331 

propose to Cynthia Cochrane for a third time that 
night. 

The unconventional strain in my blood has tri- 
umphed, and I have gone back to Fleet Street. In- 
stead of the club and its luxury of exclusiveness, 
drawing-rooms and country houses, I once more fre- 
quent the Cock, the Cheshire Cheese, and Wine Office 
Court. The freemasonry of the journalistic world 
of pressmen, war correspondents, critics, reviewers, 
authors and dramatists, has succeeded that of Society, 
with its sportsmen, idlers, and womankind. To me 

The world’s great age begins anew. 

The golden years return. 


From the moment I accepted a position in connec- 
tion with the Evening Star's new magazine and literary 
page, my old habits and mode of living have slipped 
from me as though they had never been. My fate no 
longer hangs on the cut of a coat or the folds of a 
scarf, but on quickness of brain and sureness of 
judgment. A servant of the public, with a roving 
commission to keep it supplied three times a week with 
the brightest of bright articles, I am immersed in the 
fascination of the task. When I am in search of a 
subject to deal with, nothing escapes my observation. 
The hanging sign of a beauty-specialist at once sug- 
gests a course of treatment, and ‘‘A Wrinkle Doctor 
at Work” astonishes the metropolis three days later. 
Another time it is The Morals of the Music Hall,” a 
week’s pilgrimage from the ‘‘ Met ” to the Pavilion, 
and an animated correspondence in the Evening Star 
started by myself under the pseudonym of ‘‘A Fre- 


3S2 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


quenter of the Halls,” and the limelight turned on 
Page 3 and its contents. 

Half the charm of journalism is the sense of power 
it gives. Not only have one’s words a quarter of a 
million readers, but one has the entree everywhere, 
and a sight of the chief performers on the world’s 
stage with the paint off — ^as they really are, and not 
as fame presents them. The Actor-Manager drops the 
Olympian manner and, over a. cigar in his dressing- i 

room, talks affably on the need for a National theater, i 

and “ Should Bernard Shaw be canonized or cre- 
mated?” The Cabinet Minister gives his private, as : 
distinct from his published, views on “ My Colleagues, 
and what I think of them ” ; the dancer of the moment 
describes in her motor brougham “ Heads, crowned 
and otherwise, I have turned in my career.” The 
journalist is in contact with the new ideas of the age, 
sustained through the wear and tear of his profession, ' 

by the pleasing sense that he knows more than his , 

neighbors. 

The successful journalist has to combine the quali- 
ties of an ambassador, a detective, and a man of . 
letters. He must be urbane, indomitable, able to ex- 
tract the secrets of other people without divulging his 
own, prepared to bluff every one from his news editor i 
to the village policeman, never giving up a mission i 
till he has a column of news, or been sandbagged | 
by the victims of his pertinacity and zeal. He must j 
have no qualms as to his fitness for any task allotted 3 
him, whether it be the unraveling of a crime which 
has baffled the police, and the securing, single-handed, ,] 
of a desperate ruffian, the interviewing of a Countess | 
in the middle of the night, or the description of a jj 
cross-Channel swim during the gale of the century. | 


NOVEMBER 


Carefully removing the paper guards to his cuffs, 
cramming into his pocket, in case of emergencies, the 
remains of the buttered toast he has been eating, and 
smoothing his tangled hair with a broken comb before 
two inches of cracked glass, the Pressman receives 
last instructions from his news editor, and plunges 
forth into the fray. Arriving on the scene of his as- 
signment, he is confronted with obstacle after obstacle 
set in the way of his procuring the information he 
wants, and which he has to surmount by his own 
initiative and resource. To ply reluctant folk with 
a string of questions, to be ready with the soft answer 
that turns away wrath, to climb in at the window when 
the door is closed, to mistake the servant’s No ” for 
the master’s ‘‘Yes,” to goad ignorant people into in- 
telligence, and coax silent ones into speech, to scatter 
largesse in the hope of recouping it from the cashier, 
to write good and vivacious English after six hours’ 
hard labor — these do not comprise the equipment of 
Napoleon, but of a working journalist. 

At present I am engaged on a series headed “If 
London became French,” forecasting an impossible 
future to the Entente Cordiale. The Evening Star 
artists are preparing a picture of Regent Street lined 
with cafes and kiosks, and sketching our public men 
a la Frangaise, with pince-nez, beards, and the Celtic 
fringe, while I am supplying the letterpress, describ- 
ing how Chelsea turns into a Latin Quarter, the Royal 
Academicians commit suicide in a body because of 
the raising of the national ideals of Art, the London 
County Council steamers pay at last, fights are the 
order of the day in the House of Commons, and a Bal 
Tabarin usurps the Albert Hall. In addition, the 
opinions of various prominent personages are being 


334 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


canvassed, so that one day’s number may be devoted 
to a symposium of their views on the results, beneficial 
or otherwise, of such a surprising change. I have 
been at great pains to make this last feature as com- 
plete as possible, and in many cases have interviewed 
the celebrities myself. 

It strikes me as extraordinary how some great folk 
resent being asked to talk for publication. In this 
age of advertisement the attentions of the Press should 
be encouraged rather than repelled, for it is a demon- 
strable fact that few reputations can stand without 
the newspapers. Yet I had to write to the Duchess 
of Surbiton twice, and then call at eleven one morning 
in order, when I finally did reach her presence, to be 
met with the statement from her Grace that the only 
thing we could with advantage copy the French in 
was their cooking. This brusque and discourteous 
comment is going into print in this form : 

Her Grace of Surbiton spared our representative a 
few minutes from her busy morning of arranging 
social engagements and seeing to the books (for the 
Duchess is a model housewife and keeps Surbiton 
House in “ apple-pie ” order) to discuss the subject of 
our article. 

“ How well I remember,” she said, toying the while 
with a tiny spaniel that lay in her ample lap, “those 
dear, delightful times in Paris when I was a girl ! ” — 
here the ducal bosom heaved with regret for the days 
that were gone — “the omelette aux fines herbes, the 
ragouts, the volaille supreme, the salads, the sauces, 
in fact the whole cuisine of La Belle France. There 
were chefs in those days, but now ! ” 

The gracious lady shrugged her shoulders (if a 


NOVEMBER 


335 


Duchess can have anything so common as shoulders) 
-with one of the expressive gestures caught from the 
Paris of her youth. 

‘‘We have nothing like the cooking in England,” 
went on her' Grace. “ If I had my way every Poly- 
technic” (who will say that our Aristocracy is un- 
educated?) “every Board school, would include cook- 
ery in their curriculum.” The Duchess safely 
negotiated the treacherous word, and turned to our 
representative. “ Pm afraid I can say nothing more. 
Surbiton” (the dear Duke Ed.) “doesn't like the 
papers, since they encourage Socialism. Ah ! I see my 
Secretary is waiting for me. Good-morning!” 

With a kindly smile the visitor is dismissed, to carry 
away with him the impression of a great lady, stamped 
with the caste of Vere de Vere, but interested in other 
modes of thought than her own, and carrying her 
years as lightly as her lineage bears the centuries. 

There are coals of fire heaped on her Grace’s 
toupee! The readers of the Evening Star are not 
going to be deprived of the news which is their due 
if the enterprise of the staff can secure it. 

But I can trace to another source than the charm of 
active work in Fleet Street the change which has come 
over my outlook upon my old environment, making the 
round of club and restaurant, of scandal and sport, 
belong to a shadowland, peopled with phantoms, un- 
concerned with the real issues of humanity, and only 
toying with life. It is true that I had become sud- 
denly filled with a vast amazement that I ever expected 
anything of that existence save ennui, since the inter- 
ests were so portentiously trivial, the ambitions so 
warped, and truer still that Miss Audrey Maitland has 


336 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


effected my mental transformation. I am getting 
older and wiser because she has effectually destroyed 
my interest in every other woman, and it is an interest 
in women which keeps a man young. Don Juan lives 
to a green old age. It is only when the Don Juan in 
us is “ scotched ’’ by marriage that we begin to show 
gray at the temples. And that I have said good-by 
not only to my former frivolous days, but also to 
Cynthia Cochrane, is proof positive to me that the 
pitcher has gone to the well for the last time. 

It was rash starting out in the fog. I knew it was. 
But Lady Susan Thurston had made such a point of 
my dining with them that night that it was obligatory 
on me to keep the engagement if I could. For two 
days we had lived in a city of Dreadful Night, traffic 
almost at a standstill, link-boys driving a roaring 
trade by conducting pedestrians from pavement to 
pavement, the radiance of the town departed in gloom 
and mystery. I had expected every moment to receive 
a message announcing that the function had been 
postponed, but as none came I made the perilous 
journey from Jermyn Street to Lowndes Square on 
foot under the hour, although in crossing Hyde Park 
Corner I went astray in the lines of crawling cabs 
and vehicles for ten minutes, till a man with a lantern 
came to my rescue and steered me into safety by St. 
George’s Hospital for two shillings. How Miss Mait- 
land reached the house I don’t know, but the deter- 
mination in her character, which at other times leads 
her to rebuke my shortcomings, brought her from the 
neighborhood of Portland Place by a circuitous tour 
of the Tubes. The rest of the guests failed, and the 
gaps at the dinner table, Mr. Thurston’s cough like 


NOVEMBER 


337 


a fog horn, and the inappropriate choice of pea soup 
to commence the meal with, ruined the festive side of 
the evening. The atmospheric conditions did me one 
good turn. They sent me back as escort to Audrey 
Maitland. 

‘‘ Mr. Hanbury,’’ said Lady Susan, about ten 
o’clock, when my uneasy movements proclaimed the 
strain of the forced merrymaking upon me, “you 
will have to see Miss Maitland home. I strongly dis- 
approve of young people driving about together late 
at night, but my sense of duty as chaperon must give 
way to considerations of personal safety.” 

It was not my place to offer any objections, so I 
closed with the proposal on the spot. 

When Miss Maitland and myself, cloaked and 
coated, opened the hall door, we looked into a wall 
of vapor hiding even the curb, and faintly resonant 
with the muffled sounds of an unseen world. It 
seemed hopeless to grope our way through the somber 
pall of fog, and the girl would have accepted the im- 
provised couch which the hostess made haste to offer, 
had not a “ four-wheeler ” chosen that moment for 
colliding with the lamp-post opposite, despite the fact 
that the cabman was guiding his horse by the reins, 
swearing profusely to notify all others of his progress. 

“ Hi, cab ! ” I shouted. 

The man, showing as a gray shadow at a distance of 
a few feet, looked every way to locate his would-be 
fare, even turning his face upward in case an appari- 
tion might appear from the direction of the roofs. A 
London fog so changes the accustomed order of things 
that nothing is undreamed of in Horatio’s philoso- 
phy. 

Taking my bearings Nor’-East by Sou’-West, lat. 


338 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


43°, long. io°, I marched from Lady Susan’s door- 
step to the distressed cabby. 

‘‘All right,” I exclaimed cheerfully, “you’re in 
Lowndes Square. If you go straight on for another 
ten yards you will be in the area of Number 70. Can 
you take me to Portland Place — half a sovereign an 
hour, and something hot when you get there ? ” 

“S’elp me, guv’nor, I cawn’t do it,” replied the 
fellow. “ I’ve been round this Square like a bloomin’ 
squirrel in a cage for the past three-quarters of an 
hour, and I’m nearly off my chump.” 

“ Be a sportsman ! ” I urged in desperation. “ I’ve 
got to take a young lady home, and if you get us 
there somehow I’ll ask you to the wedding.” 

Humor won where argument would conspicuously 
have failed. The man winked, drew his cab out of the 
lamp-post, and turned the horse’s head toward the 
direction in which I indicated that Knightsbridge lay. 
Hastening back to the house, I rescued Audrey Mait- 
land from the suggestions and sympathy with which 
she was being overwhelmed,, and we began our jour- 
ney through the fog, which engulfed us in an abomi- 
nation of desolation once we were out of sight of the 
pavement. Proceeding at a slow crawl, we reached 
the main thoroughfare by the French Embassy, 
crossed it without collision, by dint of much shouting 
from our guardian cabman, and, assured that by 
hugging the curb we could not go astray, I relin- 
quished my vigil at the window and turned to my 
companion in distress. 

“It’s an awful night,” I began feebly. 

“Why did Vv^e ever start?” asked the girl. “We 
shall never get home. I wish I’d accepted Lady 
Susan’s invitation to stay with them.” 


NOVEMBER 


339 


At all costs Audrey’s spirits had to be kept up. 

“ Never say die. We shall be all right.” 

‘‘ You are very cheerful.” 

Of course I am ; I’m with you.” 

The girl drew away into her corner of the cab. 

‘‘ Please don’t say those sort of things. Do be 
sensible and try to realize our danger ! ” 

‘‘ I realize my danger.^’ I put all the emphasis I 
could on the pronoun. ‘‘ I’m in deadly peril, I know.” 

‘‘Oh!” shuddered Audrey as a huge black mass 
loomed up at the window on her side, and drove her to 
seek the protection of my fur coat. How I blessed 
the van, which avoided colliding with us by a hand’s 
breadth. 

I felt myself growing light-headed. 

“Let us die together, at any rate,” and as I spoke 
I slipped my arm through hers. Providentially, the 
shaft of another cab struck us full astern, and instead 
of releasing herself, the girl pressed my arm for se- 
curity. I patted the only hand I could secure, to 
convey additional comfort to her. “We’re as right 
as rain,” I went on, with a confidence I didn’t feel. 

“ Shall we soon be there ? ” asked Audrey, ignoring 
anything unusual in our relationship. 

“ In a very few minutes now.” 

As I spoke the cab came to a dead stop. 

While our conversation had lasted we had passed 
through* a period of violent commotion, during which 
many voices had joined in a cacophony of sound, dim 
figures had sprung up out of the mist, and had been 
lost again, collisions been suddenly threatened, and 
then as suddenly been averted by magical disappear- 
ance of the obstacle — a Walpurgis Night of Brocken 
specters and phantasmagoria. But now, of a sudden. 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


we were wrapped in a silence that could be felt, the 
clinging mantle of fog hanging round us in damp 
folds, not a footfall, not a movement of life to pene- 
trate the chill shroud in which we had been prema- 
turely buried. 

Smothering my misgivings, I took out my watch. 

‘‘ Why, weVe only been thirty-five minutes,” I said. 
‘‘ I call that an excellent journey in weather like this. 
I suppose he’s ringing the bell.” 

The door creaked open, and the driver stuck his 
head in. 

“ I dunno where we are,” he muttered, with heavy 
intensity, suggestive of the view that he had given up 
all hopes of ever seeing his family again, and was 
resigned to slow starvation on the spot. In later, and 
less foggy times, his skeleton would be found to bring 
the tragedy of his fate to light. 

I got out with all haste. If Audrey wanted a good 
cry to relieve her feelings, falsely buoyed up by my 
ill-timed confidence and pleasantries, let her have it 
while my back was turned. I drew the cabman aside 
and consulted. He had, it appeared, followed the line 
of the curb past what he thought was Park Lane 
until, thrust out from its friendly pilotage by a hansom 
abandoned as derelict by the driver, he had never 
been able to regain the pavement, and in desperation 
had followed a covered van down the center of the 
roadway, encouraged to do so by the apparent sure- 
ness of judgment which was controlling its destinies. 
Then of a sudden it had stopped, and our charioteer, 
drawing level, had discovered on its box a bewildered 
individual fresh woke from sleep. But the most 
puzzling feature to the cabman was the non-appear- 
ance of the slope of Piccadilly. Faith may be able 


NOVEMBER 


841 


to remove mountains, but it hadn’t been able in his 
case to prevent the removal of the hill in Piccadilly. 

In emergencies he who hesitates is lost. 

‘‘ I’ve got it,” I said, with calm decision. “ We are 
on the top of the hill looking toward the Circus. Go 
quickly to the right, and when you come to the Park 
railings call out.” 

The man vanished, walking gingerly as though he 
expected snakes to materialize from the wood pave- 
ment. In a few moments I heard his shout, “ There’s 
a row of bloomin’ ’ouses.” 

“ Confound it ! ” I said when he came back, guided 
by my cries. “You must have turned right around, 
and be taking us back to Lowndes Square. The park 
is on our left. I’ll find it in a brace of shakes.” 

All I did, however, was to find another row of 
houses. Had we all died in our sleep and become 
ghosts, condemned to an endless quest in a foggy 
Purgatory for a phantom Portland Place ? Surely we 
hadn’t been such sinners ! Then a stroke of luck hap- 
pened. A person, solid-looking enough to dispel all 
fears that I was disembodied, who was advancing by 
means of clutching on the area railings of each house 
in turn, ran into me. I hugged my bruise and greeted 
him. 

“ Hello, where are you? ” 

“ Well,” he replied, “ I left Grosvenor Square twenty 
minutes ago, and I ought to be in North Audley Street 
by now.” 

How on earth had our cab taken the intricate turn- 
ings requisite to land us there? It always seems to 
me a difficult route to steer in daylight, through the 
narrow, winding passage from Park Lane. 

“Are you quite sure?” 


343 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


I put this further question to my savior, but he had 
started on another area and was swallowed up in 
blackness. With difficulty I regained the cab and 
revealed the truth to the cabby. His blank amaze- 
ment was refreshing, but he had other news for me. 

“ Pore young laidy,’’ and he jerked a finger to- 
ward the cab. “ Taking it very much to ’eart. 
She thinks you’ve gone forever. No weddin’, no 
nuffin’,” and he dashed an imaginary tear to the 
ground. 

“ Nonsense,” I replied sharply. ‘‘ We’re not going 
to be married.” 

‘‘Not going to be married 1”^ — and the cabman 
slapped his chest. “Why, I’d never of come this 
blasted journey if I ’adn’t thought I was doing a kind . 
turn to a pair o’ ‘ spoons ’ ! ” 

“ What’s the man saying ? ” 

Why Audrey Maitland chose that particular mo- 
ment to interrupt the tete-a-tHe between the cabman 
and myself passes my comprehension. It was un- 
canny to a degree. 

“ The fog’s got into his head,” I stammered. “ He 
was telling me that his sister was going to be married, 
and he intended giving her two spoons.” 

My interruption was ignored. 

“What did you say?” the girl asked the cabby 
imperiously. 

The man shuffled his feet, an irritating habit, but 
that didn’t justify the severe tone Audrey Maitland 
addressed him in. 

“Did that gentleman say we were going to be 
married, and induce you to take us as fares in con- 
sequence? Did he say that?” 

Audrey had been listening all the time, the deceit- 


NOVEMBER 


34.3 


ful creature! My blood boiled with anger, and 
several other feelings I shan’t specify, and carried me 
out of my usual timid self. 

“ Yes I ” I exclaimed, ‘‘ I said all that, and I’d say 
it again if necessary. I am going to marry you. Get 
back into the cab this instant, or you won’t survive 
to marry anybody. And you,” I said to the cabby, 
paralyzed at the turn given to the situation, ‘‘ take us 
where the devil you like. But if you get into another 
mess, you must find your way out yourself. Don’t 
bother me ! ” And I climbed back into the cab, which 
had suddenly become the most desirable spot on earth. 
I registered a sudden vow to pass the rest of my days 
in four-wheelers. 

‘^Audrey!” 

Not a sound escaped from the girl, hidden in her 
corner. Very gently I took her hand, which lay im- 
passive in mine. 

“Audrey, I told the truth to the cabman. I love 
you. I am going to marry you. Will you marry 
me?” 

There came the soft pressure of her fingers on 
mine. That was the only answer I got, but it was 
sufficient ! 

I believe we reached Portland Place about mid- 
night, and I know I gave the cabman a five-pound 
note. “ The rest is silence.” 


T 




DECEMBER 


The poppied sleep, the end of all’* — Swinburne. 



DECEMBER 


Hanbury v. Hanhiiry, Rev. Sturgis intervening — The 
Plight of a Fiance — A Bachelor Deceased 

M y engagement to Audrey Maitland, the public 
announcement of which appeared in the 
Morning Post less than a week after the events in the 
fog, has been welcomed nowhere more heartily than 
in my own family. The bachelor career of an only 
son gives rise to apprehensions which are entertained 
in lesser degree where the male olive branches grow 
thicker, and I learned from my father's confidences 
how deeply concerned my parents had been lest I 
should bring an unsuitalDle bride to receive their 
blessing. 

‘‘ All anxiety is laid at rest now, Gerald," my father 
said as we sat together settling ways and means dur- 
ing a week-end I had stolen from Fleet Street. But 
I must confess we had grave misgivings as to your 
possible choice of a wife." 

‘‘ My dear father," was my reply, it is the parents' 
fault when a son marries a barmaid, and a daughter 
elopes with her riding-master. The society of the 
opposite sex is a necessity for healthy youth, and if 
girls and boys can't meet possible suitors of their own 
rank in life at home, they will cultivate impossible ones 
outside it. For all the young women mother has 
made any efforts to invite here, I might have died 
celibate." 

“ Yes, your mother is difficult, I know. She says 
she finds everybody unsuitable when she comes to 
make their acquaintance." 

347 


348 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


But that’s no excuse, sir, for having nobody down 
here. Look at Dulcie. Is she going to marry the 
curate, for as far as I can make out he’s the only man 
ever about the place?” 

If I had wished to draw a red-herring across the 
trail of my own affairs I couldn’t have done better 
than drag in the curate. 

“ Should you call Dulcie impressionable ? ” asked 
my father, with apparent irrelevance. 

‘‘Well, as she’s my sister, she probably is,” I re- 
torted. ^ I thought she took a fancy to George Burn 
at Easter, but then taking a fancy to George is like 
taking a share in a foreign lottery. There are so many 
competitors that the chance of drawing the prize is one 
in ten thousand.” 

“ Why is it,” mused my father, still pursuing the 
devious line of thought he had started on, “that 
though the clergy occupy such a privileged position, 
and play the chief part in the most important crises 
of life, one never welcomes them as prospective mem- 
bers of one’s own household with any enthusiasm? 
You would have broken my heart, Gerald, if you had 
wanted to enter the Church.” 

“Fortunately, sir,” I replied, “I preferred giving 
orders to taking them. What’s the ‘padre’ here 
like? I didn’t see much of him when I was down 
here last.” 

My parent rubbed his chin. 

“ The Rev. Mr. Sturgis is a regular curate,” he said, 
with apt description.. “ Your sister’s got the woman’s 
notion that to marry a clergyman is a mission.” 

“ So it is, submission ! What makes you think the 
matter is serious ? ” 

“ Dulcie attends the early morning Celebration, she 


DECEMBER 


349 


reads the Parish Magazine, and she thinks he sings 
quite nicely, when she must know he’s never in tune.” 

I gave a groan. ‘‘She’s as good as engaged, sir. 
Can’t anything be done ? ” 

“ Your sister looks up to you, Gerald,” said my 
father, “ because of your friendship with Mr. Steward. 
If you should say something it might have an effect. 
It’s very hard that these domestic worries should come 
on top of the agricultural depression.” 

I agreed, and with that our conversation “ returned 
to its muttons.” My father, desirous that the mar- 
riage should take place as soon after the New Year 
as possible, made such handsome provision for Audrey 
and myself that the financial side of the question was 
settled there and then. 

My own satisfaction was considerably modified by 
the suspicion sown in my mind that my only sister 
might be about to endow me with a clerical brother- 
in-law. Without doubt Dulcie is impressionable, and 
lacking the worldly wisdom to counteract her impulses. 
How often do those sudden attachments formed for a 
partner at a county ball, or the mysterious masked 
soloist on the sands, survive the discovery that the 
parent is “ something in the city,” or that the adored 
one’s handwriting resembles the perambulations of a 
spider which has fallen into the inkpot and is trying 
to dry itself? That is to say, the budding affections 
wither away in the case of a well-balanced person, but 
with Dulcie the prudent course would savor of 
cowardice, and she would feel all the more attracted to 
the individual placed on the wrong side of such social 
gulfs. But I didn’t see what I could do, nor how I 
could lead up to so delicate a subject without giving 
the show away. 


350 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


When I am undecided I am wont to trust to the in- 
spiration of the moment, and on this occasion it came 
on Sunday afternoon, when Dulcie was doing needle- 
work, and I was reaping a miscellaneous harvest from 
the bookshelf. It was in Dr. Johnson’s criticism of 
Pope, in his Lives of the Poets, that I came upon the 
following passage : 

‘‘ The freaks, and humors, and spleen, and vanity 
of women, as they embroil families in discord, and 
fill houses with disquiet, do more to obstruct the hap- 
piness of life in a year than the ambition of the clergy 
in many centuries.” 

I gave a hoarse chuckle at the Doctor’s mellow 
wisdom. 

Dulcie looked up. “What’s the matter?” she 
asked. 

“ Listen to this ! ” I said, and read the passage. 

Dulcie tossed her head. “ An ill-tempered, spiteful 
old man ! ” 

“ You’ve got to live as long as the Doctor to see the 
truth of it,” I remarked. “ He couples women and 
clergymen as the disturbing elements in life. Women 
and clergymen,” I repeated sagely. 

“ Gerald ! ” Dulcie’s voice sounded sharply. “ Has 
father or mother been saying anything to you ? ” 

I assumed my “ village idiot ” expression. 

“ No. Why, what do you mean? ” 

“ Nothing,” said Dulcie, bending quickly over her 
work, but not quick enough to hide her rising color 
from me. 

I pretended complete ignorance of my sister’s con- 
fusion, and went on with my homily. 


DECEMBER 


351 


“ The ambition of the clergy — I wish they had more, 
or, rather, one that took a different form than that of 
having twice as many children as they possess ‘hun- 
dreds’ a year. No clergyman should marry until he 
is an archdeacon, and as for curates, matrimony on 
their part ought to be a penal offense, entailing the loss 
of civil rights for seven years.” 

“ What are civil rights ? ” asked Dulcie, not in the 
least interested, but anxious to stave off further de- 
nunciation of the “Cloth.” 

“ The right to give up one’s place in a public con- 
veyance to a woman and strap-hang; the right to jump 
up from a comfortable chair to open the door for her ; 
the right to accept personal discomfort as though it 
were pleasure in order to conform to a medieval code 
of chivalry. But to return to curates ” 

Dulcie gave a start. So she’d thought, had she, 
that she was to be spared any more wounds in her ten- 
derest feelings? When I undertake a commission I 
invariably execute it. 

“ The only one of my contemporaries at Oxford who 
became a curate,” I rolled out, “ died from injuries he 
received at the hands of a landowner whose daughter 
he was courting against her parents’ will, after a three- 
quarters of an hour’s sermon, on a day, too, when the 
ice in the park bore for the first time that winter. The 
coroner’s jury returned a verdict of ‘ Natural death,’ 
and very natural it was under the circumstances. No, 
curates are outside the pale of human tolerance and 
charity ! ” 

“ Gerald,” said Dulcie, “ I quite agree with you. I 
haven’t heard that point of view put so clearly before ! 
How well you express yourself ! ” and she sighed with 
regret for all those rosy visions of a future in a vicar- 


S52 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


age which my logic and eloquence had destroyed for- 
ever. Nevermore, she felt, could she be comfortable 
in the company of a man the faults of whose calling 
had been so strikingly revealed to her. To show her 
gratitude to me for tearing the scales from her eyes, 
Dulcie put down her needlework and, crossing the 
room, perched herself on the arm of my chair, put one 
arm around my neck, and began stroking my hair. 
*'Dear little sister,” I thought. ‘‘If only I could 
help to make you as happy as I am.” 

“ Gerald,” said Dulcie in her sweetest tones, “ I am 
so glad you are going to marry Audrey. She^s a per- 
fect darling! But I shall miss you dreadfully. I 
didn’t realize before how much a kind brother, like 
you have always been, meant to a girl. You are so 
clever, and see through things so quickly, that I can’t 
think what I shall do without your advice.” 

I was thoroughly touched. Gratitude of any kind 
is rare, and between members of the same family 
phenomenally so. Dulcie had done me the justice to 
recognize the disinterestedness of my counsel, and 
some reparation was undoubtedly due from myself to 
the little girl at my side. As I had pulled down one 
plan of her own, I must help to build another in its 
place. 

“ I shall miss you, too, Dulcie,” I said. “ I’ve tried 
to be a good brother to you, and if I have sometimes 
been rather ‘ down ’ on you, it’s only because I’ve 
taken such interest in you. But if ever you want any 
help come to me. I’ll do anything to make you 
happy.” 

Dulcie bent down and kissed me. 

“ Would you really do anything for me, Gerald ? ” 
she whispered. “ For I do want your help now.” 


DECEMBER 


353 


I made a rapid mental calculation. After all, Dulcie 
deserved a return for so bravely throwing over her 
curate, on whom her thoughts, I am sure, had been set 
before I spoke to her. It was probably some trivial 
service she had in mind, magnified by her feminine 
lack of proportion. Her faith in me had been so 
touching that I could rely on her asking me nothing 
I couldn't readily grant. 

Yes ; I will do anything for you." 

“ Promise me on your word of honor that you will 
never go back on your word, but will always stand by 
me ! " 

If it had been a man who had tried to extract this 
solemn pledge from me I should have been suspicious, 
but women love these dramatic touches. 

“ All right, Dulcie. I promise on my word of honor 
to stand by you. What is it ? ” 

Dulcie drew my cheek close to hers. ‘‘ Gerald, Pm 
secretly engaged to Mr. Sturgis. I’m so glad you’re 
going to help me to marry him.’’ 

It is a rule of mine never to swear before ladies, but 
I broke it six times in as many seconds, before leaping 
to my feet in a towering rage. 

‘‘Dulcie, you deceitful little hypocrite! you aban- 
doned little wretch ! How dare you make me promise 
a thing like that? I’ll never, never, never trust you 
again, or believe a word you say ! ’’ 

Dulcie burst into tears, and buried her head in the 
cushions. I looked into the glass to straighten my tie, 
grinding my teeth to keep my temper up to fighting 
pitch, and drown the noise of Dulcie’s sobs. Crying 
is a most unfair weapon to fight with. However 
much a man may be in the right, tears make him feel 
a brute, in spite of himself. I stood on the hearthrug, 


354 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


like a convicted criminal, when all the while I was 
championing* the cause of Truth and Decency against 
my sister’s attacks upon those sacred principles in our 
domestic and civic life. 

“ For heaven’s sake, Dulcie, don’t cry like that,” I 
exclaimed in desperation, ‘‘or I shall shriek aloud. 
You’ve behaved very badly to me, but I won’t go back 
on my word, although I ought to. You’ve played 
it low down upon a trusting brother, but if you’ll stop 
that noise and promise to do nothing rash, — registrar’s 
office, for example, — I’ll see what I can do. There 
now ! ” 

My sister changed gears, turned off the radiator, 
and ceased to exceed the speed limit. In a few mo- 
ments she was drying her eyes, and turning up her 
tearstained cheek to be kissed. But as I kissed it I 
wasn’t thinking of Dulcie, but of myself, and how I 
had been outwitted by a girl in her teens. So much 
for masculine vainglory! 

The only one of my friends to whom I am not an 
object of chaff and commiseration is young Massey, 
and his sedulous inquiries as to the conditions of an 
engagement, and the sensations engendered by it, 
show that he takes far too intelligent and lively an 
interest in it for his two and twenty years. The great 
problem before him is the choice of a career, not a 
wife, and if I were Lady Susan Thurston, which, thank 
God, I’m not. I’d forbid Clive Massey to see anything 
of Dolly until he could call with a check for £ioo 
and say, “I’ve earned it.” But with this not very 
bright exception I am made to feel by George and 
Archie Haines and the rest that I have betrayed the 
citadel of my sex, and handed over the keys to the 


DECEMBER 


355 


enemy. I am stopped, too, from airing a contrary 
view by the quoting against me of my own dicta, 
uttered six months ago, and which have been pre- 
served by oral tradition owing to their spontaneity 
and wit. I am a jester strangled with his own toby. 

In one’s salad days one knows, really, very little 
about women, for the light side of the lantern is al- 
ways turned on one. With a more intimate experi- 
ence of the sex the crudity of a bachelor’s notions gets 
toned down. The disgusting selfishness of the un- 
married man appals me now that I have risen to loftier 
heights of sacrifice, but I see it is useless to convince 
hardened skeptics of the type of George Burn as to the 
reformation to be effected in their characters by get- 
ting engaged to what is described as a nice girl.” 
To any right-minded bachelor all girls are nice, and 
discrimination only sets in when the fact of his en- 
gagement makes it an act of disloyalty to his fiancee 
to think otherwise. Some day George will be in the 
same plight, and then he will come to me for advice, 
and get the stiffest lecture on his past career he has 
ever had. When that is done I shall be ready to give 
him tips, and the first one, printed in the heaviest type, 
and framed to hang over his bed so as to drive home 
its message, will be, ‘‘Have as short an engagement 
as possible.” 

The engagement is a strain for both the “ high con- 
tracting parties,” to quote a phrase from the preamble 
of treaties which takes my fancy, since the couple are 
in much the same state of excitement as that which fills 
children in the theater before the curtain has risen. 
Audrey is a sensible girl, and she does her best to 
assuage the miseries of my position, but she can’t alle- 
viate the sufferings of being “ bear-led ” around her 


S56 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


relatives and made to show my paces, or of the surfeit 
of one person’s society which an engagement involves. 
I’m sure it’s a great mistake for engaged couples to 
spend all their time together. To get to know each 
other too well leaves nothing to occupy those long, 
long evenings, after baby has been put to bed, and 
before the last post has brought its sheaf of household 
bills. Then, surely, is the time to explore the depths 
of a wife’s character, and, by skillful inquiry into 
parental antecedents, to discover whether that tendency 
to hysteria at the breakfast table, which does so much 
to make home seem like home, comes from the aunt 
who gained ‘‘honorable mention” in the class for 
goiters at the Hydrocephalic Congress, or the uncle 
who became an involuntary parricide by aiming with 
a coal-hammer at the blue rat he saw (and corrobo- 
rated the fact on oath in the subsequent criminal pro- 
ceedings) running over his father’s bald head. To 
postpone such research work till after the nuptial knot 
has been irrevocably tied adds to that unexpectedness 
which is the chief charm of marriage. 

Far and away the worst ordeal is the personally con- 
ducted tour through her family circle which the bride- 
elect inflicts on the bridegroom-to-be. Nearly every 
night I am the honored guest of one branch or an- 
other of the Maitland family, and suffer the same 
pangs as seized me when I underwent viva voce 
examinations in the University of Oxford, painfully 
aware of my own limitations and the overwhelming 
odds against me. Most of Audrey’s relatives act upon 
the assumption that she isn’t fit to choose a husband 
for herself, and that therefore it is their duty to make 
her realize how unworthy is the object of her choice. 
The questions they address to me prove that Lodge's 


DECEMBER 


357 


County Families has been searched in the hopes of 
finding a blot upon the Hanbury escutcheon, and in de- 
fault of damning evidence there, I must be made to re- 
veal personal shortcomings. I don't know that I 
don't prefer this attitude to the one adopted by those 
ladies who fall upon my neck and welcome me into 
their circle with embraces. I can stand being cut, 
but not kissed. 

I must make a very poor figure in the eyes of the 
uncles, aunts, cousins and personal friends who are 
invited to inspect the new recruit at dinner. I enter 
the room crowded with strange faces, as well hidden 
behind Audrey's skirts as I can contrive. A silence 
falls upon the groups, which have been chatting ani- 
matedly till we arrive to stop the conversation, so that 
our gestures may be studied, the exact angle of my 
handshake and bow noted. Trembling in every limb, 
I am introduced to General Sir George and Lady Mait- 
land, Mrs. Maitland, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Maitland, 
Miss Maitland, Mr. Humphrey Maitland, the Misses 
Clodagh and Grace Maitland, and expected to remem- 
ber the identity of each upon any subsequent occasion 
I address them. I meet the uncle whose bump of 
philo-progenitiveness stands out like a volcanic crater, 
and who initiates me into all the family scandals of the 
last two generations. I take into dinner a maiden aunt 
whom I form an instant aversion for because her idea 
of breaking the ice is to suggest that I shall volunteer 
assistance to her creche in Whitechapel. On my other 
side is a lady who knows some distant cousins of mine, 
and expects me to supply their biographies while I 
am struggling with a tough pheasant as full of lead as 
a 9.7 gun. I explain that I am no relation to the 
Hanburys of Crane Court, that my father hasnT 


358 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


married twice and mortgaged his estate up to the hilt, 
and that I am older than I look. I listen to statements 
that Audrey isn’t an heiress, but that her mother was 
a Mold, one of the old Molds of Worcestershire. I 
drink sour claret and smoke green cigars — all for love 
of Audrey. Can devotion go further ? 

The presents are a more satisfactory side to an en- 
gagement, and with my wedding fixed for early in 
January, they have already begun to oust my books 
from the table to the floor, and to litter my rooms with ' 
straw and tissue paper. One of the first to arrive was 
a dispatch box from Mrs. Bellew, a handsome present 
considering her frustrated hopes for Sybil. 

“ We are so glad,” Mrs. Bellew wrote, ‘‘ that you 
have at last settled to marry, and such a charming girl 
as we hear Miss Maitland is. Sybil thinks she has 
met her, but can remember nothing about her. I am 
afraid we shan’t get to the wedding, as we are think- 
ing of going to St. Moritz after Christmas.” Mrs. 
Bellew needn’t have qualified her generosity in that 
way! 

The Thurstons have sent a bridge table, and an in- 
vitation to Rosshire next autumn for the pair of us. 
Griffiths’ contribution is a liqueur set — ‘‘ The married 
man’s best friend,” as he described it in the covering 
note. From Lady Fullard came an electro-plated 
butter dish, which I had the presence of mind to 
change at once for a cigarette case. I don’t want a 
butter dish ornamented with an embossed head of 
King Edward upon my breakfast table. 

I was much puzzled as to the donor of a finely 
bound set of Browning’s works, till I found a sheet of 
paper slipped in to mark the poem “ Any Wife to Any 
Husband,” and containing one line : 


DECEMBER 


359 


May you be as happy as I mean to be. 

‘‘Julia Ponting-Mallow.’' 

So that escapade with Rowan has brought good in 
its train, since it has taught Mrs. Mallow contentment 
with her lot. 

But it was not until a parcel arrived addressed in 
Cynthia Cochrane’s handwriting, that I suddenly real- 
ized I had all the while been wondering whether I 
should hear again from her. I undid the coverings 
hastily, to find a miniature set in a plain gold circlet, 
with my monogram on the back. The likeness was 
remarkable, done with a daintiness that reproduced the 
beauty of Cynthia so vividly that all the tumultuous 
memories of the past rushed back again. A letter ac- 
companied the gift: 

“Dear Gerald: 

“ I am sending you a memento of our friendship as 
a message of good luck. Still think of me as a friend 
who wishes you well, whatever happens. As you told 
me, I have my career, and careers have a way of not 
going with happiness. You are one of the lucky peo- 
ple who have found how to combine both. Jimmy 
Berners is, at last, beginning to realize that I shan’t 
like him any the less if I don’t see so much of him. 
Who knows but that importunity and persistence may 
not win the day over romance? 

“ Good-by, Gerald ; you can be a hard man to a 
woman. Show your wife the soft side of your nature 
sometimes. 

“Cynthia.” 

A husband and wife, they say, should have no 


860 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


secrets from each other. All the same, I shan’t show 
Audrey that letter. 

My race is run, and I am ready to stand before the 
altar of St. George’s, Hanover Square, and swear 
away my single-blessedness with an “ I will ” in which 
the spectator may detect a cheerful or a mournful note, 
as he pleases, for I have spent the last New Year’s 
Eve of my bachelor life with my three greatest friends, 
Frank Steward, Archie Haines, and George Burn, and 
I am sitting, solitary, before the dead ashes on the 
hearth, with an empty pipe between my teeth. 

At first I had contemplated gathering some twenty 
acquaintances around me for the last solemn rite of 
drinking ‘‘ no heel-taps ” to my wedded future, but, 
uncertain as to how far I could control my feelings 
when the moment came for ‘‘Ave atque Vale,” I did 
not wish to parade my sorrow before folk who might 
be unsympathetic. I therefore limited my hospitality 
to the three men I knew I could trust never to reveal 
any weakness I might display, for New Year’s Eve 
is a celebration I always find affecting. To strike a 
moral balance sheet, and reckon the profit or loss of 
the past twelve months, is a responsible undertaking. 
Even a saint must expect to find a few items, which no 
sophistry can explain away, to cause a twinge of con- 
science, although as time goes on one’s sense of pro- 
portion tends to adjust itself. The facts which seem 
to require expiation at twenty, merely evoke a tolerant 
smile at thirty. The mortal sins of our youth are the 
peccadilloes of our middle age. If George, for in- 
stance, wore a hair shirt for every indiscretion he had 
committed in the year, he would appear as bulky as an 
Eskimo in winter plumage. The philosopher, rather. 


DECEMBER 


361 


spends New Year’s Eve in self-satisfie'd recollection of 
the failings of the past, and in pleasurable anticipation 
of those to be indulged in the future. And it was in 
some such mood that Haines and George arrived in 
Jermyn Street to partake of my farewell supper, for 
they showed no sense of their coming loss, and in- 
dulged in ill-timed jibes at my expense. Steward, 
too, whom I relied upon to tune the proceedings to the 
key of doleful reminiscence in which I wished the 
scene to be played, encouraged the others in their 
badinage, by telling me to “ cheer up” and not be ‘‘ as 
morbid as a mute at a funeral ” when I commented on 
their bad taste. 

I had no appetite when we four sat down to dinner, 
but that didn’t excuse George snatching my oysters, 
in order, as he said, ‘Ho accustom Hanbury to the 
frugal fare of married life.” 

“ I know,” I said, “ that marriage means giving up 
many of the luxuries to which one is accustomed, but 
oysters aren’t luxuries, they are necessities.” Where- 
upon I recovered the “ succulent shellfish ” {znde 
Little Willy’s Natural History) by main force, and 
left George lamenting. 

“ I always thought you were going to get off scot- 
free, Hanbury,” remarked Haines, when we were well 
under way with the soup. 

“You needn’t talk as though I had been convicted 
of some crime,” I retorted, nettled. 

“We shall hear of Haines going off next,” said 
Steward. 

“ There’ll be no fuss about it, anyhow, when I do,” 
Haines replied. 

“No, that will come afterward,” I interrupted. 
We had assembled to talk about myself, not of what 


S62 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


Haines would or would not do in a remote con- 
tingency. The excitement of seeing George help him- 
self to whitebait with a fork came to my aid, and by 
the time the meal had resumed its smooth progress, I 
was in possession of the House. 

‘‘Marriage is not the separation from old interests 
and friends that it is assumed to be. The wise man 
makes the best of both worlds.” 

“ Yes, my friend,” said Steward, “but don’t end up, 
like Mahomet’s coffin, halfway between heaven and 
earth. In a few weeks you are going to marry a 
charming girl. Thank God for it, and don’t let any 
one of us to-night say anything to belittle your good 
fortune. Here’s to your happiness and hers ! ” and 
although it was nowhere near the period of the even- 
ing for toasts. Steward raised his glass to mine, and 
we drained our bumpers as one man. 

I felt deeply grateful to the speaker, not only for his 
sentiments, but also for the harmony he spread over 
the party. George and Haines ceased to tease their 
host, and the host himself threw off the shades of 
regret which had begun to close over him and entered 
on a strain of cheerful recollection which set every one 
recalling the adventures they had had together, and 
forecasting the others they would share. Steward 
excelled himself as a raconteur and a wit, while the 
courses advanced and the wine circulated, till the 
mirage of an existence without a care or a sorrow 
floated before the mind’s eye of each member of the 
party. Upon this flow of words and thought Haines’ 
proposal of my health intervened, to which I suitably 
responded and brought the speech-making officially to 
a close, when George, who had shown signs of pre- 
occupation for the past five minutes, jumped to his 


DECEMBER 863 

feet and, laboring under strong excitement, gave the 
unconventional toast of ‘‘ Lost Opportunities.” 

George on the hustings was George in a new role, 
but, carried away upon a wave of emotion, he made 
his oratorical bow with credit. 

‘"Opportunity,” said George, “ makes the thief, but 
lost opportunity marks the coward, the man who can 
write ‘ Fain would I rise, but that I fear to fall.’ The 
host of the evening” — I bowed in astonishment as to 
what was coming next — “ is losing the greatest of all 
opportunities, the free life of the bachelor. If I ” — 
George struck his shirt front — “ lose an opportunity — 
I forbear to mention what opportunities — I can 
retrieve it. Not so Mr. Gerald Hanbury! Hence- 
forward he is not his own master. ‘ Vae Victis.’ To 
him, as to the wounded gladiator in the Coliseum, the 
thumbs of the spectators have been turned down, and 
he must die.” 

George drew his handkerchief out and mopped his 
eyes. Really he was acting a part very well, and a 
part I should have applauded him in once. 

“ Marriage,” he repeated, “ involves the loss of the 
greatest of all opportunities,” and, proceeding, he 
drew a highly colored picture of what he thought 
marriage was — a kind of inferno of discomfort, in 
which the screams of teething children mingled with 
the lurid blasphemies of drunken domestics. Then, 
against this grotes^jue travesty of the truth, George 
set up a rose-red fantasy and styled it bachelorhood, 
devoting a purple patch of rhetoric to a mythical 
monstrosity he called “ the happy bachelor.” 

“ This,” said George, “ was our host, Gerald Han- 
bury. He is no more. To-night we stand by his 
open grave, and drop into it a sprig of rosemary — for 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


S64i 

remembrance!’’ Here the speaker resumed his seat 
‘‘amidst the thunder of the captains and the shout- 
ing.” 

Steward instantly stood up. 

“ I rise to respond on behalf of the dead man,” he 
began. “ The late Gerald Hanbury, bachelor, could 
he speak for himself, would say that in marrying he 
was seizing the greatest opportunity of his life. He 
has fought gallantly in the foeman’s ranks till over- 
whelmed. As he lies in his warrior’s grave he de- 
serves the reverence, and not the scorn, of men. 
What are the opportunities he loses by committing 
the noble sacrifice of ‘ hara-kiri ’ ? ” asked Steward, 
and went on to enumerate a grim catalogue^ — the op- 
portunity for self-indulgence, for intrigue, for all 
the pleasant vices George had hugged to himself with 
such unction. The “ happy bachelor ” was stripped 
of the finery George had wrapped him in, and shown 
to be a thing of shreds and patches. 

“ The married man,” proceeded the journalist, 
“ rises Phoenix-like from his bachelor self — ^bright and 
burnished. And looking into the tomb where the 
dead creature lies, he addresses it thus: ‘While 
breath was in you I lived the life you bade me, caring 
nothing for the great moments of life, passing my 
days in a fairyland of toys and trinkets, never raising 
my eyes to the riches and realities of the splendid 
world. I regret nothing, however, for out of the 
child I was has grown the man I am. Pass away 
into the limbo where discarded relics and beliefs lie.’ 
Lo and behold, the corpse crumbles into dust and is 
gone.” 

Steward waved his hand at George and Haines with 
a magician’s pass. “Vanish, phantoms, you are dis- 


DECEMBER 


S65 


embodied spirits compared with our resurrected host. 
He has been down into the dark places of the earth 
to find his Proserpine, and he stands now in the light 
of a sun you cannot see. For, if he has lost the op- 
portunity of bachelorhood, he has found himself! ” 
‘‘A very good effort,” said George irreverently, 
‘‘ but whaCs it all worth ? ” 

‘‘As much as yours,” retorted Steward, following 
my example and moving away from the table to the 
armchairs, and as George wasn’t prepared to put an 
immediate price on his own philosophy, the matter 
dropped. There we sat in a ring talking as only men 
bound by ties of intimate friendship can talk, while 
the Old Year died and the New Year was born, and 
hour after hour struck from the tower of the neigh- 
boring church. It was past three o’clock when 
Haines dragged us apart, and the final leave-taking 
began. We should meet again, but never as fancy- 
free. The shadow of “ The Sex ” would be over us. 
Haines, George, Steward — each in turn gripped my 
hand, and, as they struggled into their coats, gave 
expression to the affectionate regard they had for me. 
But I listened in distracted silence, as though their 
farewells came from a great distance, and from beings 
of a different creation — ^finding no words to fit the 
tragedy. Not till they had gone, and were falling 
noisily down the darkened stairs, did I wake to a 
realization of the parting. In that bitter moment I 
nearly ran after them, saying, “ I am coming with 
you, don’t leave me.” But I controlled myself to 
clutch the mantelpiece in a despair that defied con- 
solation. 

Suddenly a thought struck me. I would make a 
bonfire of Vanities rivaling Savonarola’s in Florence, 


m 


TOO MANY WOMEN 


so gathering from my drawers and shelves the miscel- 
laneous spoils of years, I heaped them in the fender 
and set them alight. There were at least three hun- 
dred dance programmes, dating back to the Com- 
memoration balls of my early manhood, three locks of 
hair of varying shades, collected out of bravado rather 
than devotion — all the same I felt a pang as they were 
consumed; several signed photographs, marking as 
many daydreams, one, I am ashamed to say, of a 
barmaid in the Lakes, the trophy of as wet a week 
as only Lakeland can show; a lady's shoe, minus a 
heel, its white satin surface lost beneath a coating of 
dust ; a fat packet, tied up with a bootlace, of a corre- 
spondence that was only checked by parental inter- 
vention, and in pursuit of which I displayed more 
sincerity than ever I have shown since ; and a vagrant 
mass of ribbons and bows, spangled hair ornaments 
and cotillon favors — in short, the complete arsenal 
of a man of sentiment. 

As the funeral pyre of my romantic self blazed, I 
dived at random into the letters to catch a fleeting 
glimpse of that far-away idyll. But the reading left 
me cold. I could not recapture the fragrance of the 
rose leaves, and the passion of the writer struck no 
answering chord in me. In petulance I threw the 
bundle on the flames, whence, in a brief time, it 
vanished up the chimney. I never saw an affaire 
du cceur so easily and expeditiously disposed of. 

Jealously was that conflagration guarded until not 
a relic of my bachelor self remained. I was resolved 
to keep that memory untouched by matrimony. 
Audrey has neither part nor parcel in the man I have 
been. The Future is hers, not the Past. That be- 
longs to me alone. 











JUN 18 1310 


One copy del. to Cat. Div. 


JUN M 18M1 





